Covid-19-pandemins ekonomiska påverkan på det kollektiva resandet i Värmland : En kvalitativ studie för Region Värmlands Kollektivtrafiks hantering av Covid-19-pandemin

Sammanfattning: In recent years, the world has been living in a pandemic where major adaptations have been necessary following the global advance of the Covid-19 virus. In many ways, this has changed the way society manages crises but despite this, public transport has been running in all cities across Sweden even under current restrictions. Sweden´s strategy against corona was different from most other countries and we will analyse an important everyday component of society in this paper - local public transport - and how it was affected by the pandemic. Covid-19 / SARS-CoV-2 is a dangerous and infectious virus that is ultimately spread through the saliva or exhalation of an infected person’s cough or sneeze. The virus has more or less shut down most countries in the world, stretched health services to breaking point, quarantined people, put large numbers of people out of work and affected the entire world economy. Public transport is one of the many businesses affected, as many of Sweden’s regions, public transport boards and companies have been advised by the Swedish Public Health Agency to continue using public transport. Costs for fuel, salaries, traffic service, infrastructure and school buses have remained intact, while revenues have fallen drastically.   Despite warnings from experts, it has become clear that authorities, regions and companies were poorly prepared for an international crisis such as Covid-19. Few organisations could foresee such a world wide event and have the capacity to deal with the pandemic, not just as a single issue, for example in medicine or technology, but from several angles simultaneously. Changes in human behaviour are also of interest in terms of public transport and the spread of Covid-19. The disease has caused a large part of the world’s populations to change their travel habits.