STOCKHOLM: Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said on Tuesday public gatherings would remain limited to eight people over the upcoming Christmas and New Year's holidays, a limit that should be the norm for also private festivities.

"This year, Christmas cannot be as usual," Lofven told a news conference.

Sweden, whose rejection of lockdowns and widespread face mask use has left it an outlier in Europe, is in the throes of a second wave of the pandemic that has claimed more than 7,000 lives, far more than the rest of the Nordic region combined.