The Coronavirus

[Bob Butler 54]

(04-30-2020, 11:03 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(04-30-2020, 07:35 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I note how many Asian countries had encountered the SARS and MERS epidemics had planned for future outbreaks.  The plans seemed to have worked, in spite of a few mistakes, and in contrast to Trump dismissing our planners.

Wrong.  The "ME" in MERS stands for the Middle East, which is not the same as Asia, as you may not be aware.  Most Pacific Rim countries have seen at least one change of government since SARS.

To the extent there was a benefit, it was from most of the citizens having been through it before with SARS, and acting before the governments could interfere.  Japan and Taiwan did have early restrictions on travel from China, but South Korea missed the boat on that.

Wrong.  South Korea had the world’s largest MERS outbreak outside the Middle East.  They learned from that outbreak.  I picked that up from a post that you yourself made, but apparently absorbed only the parts that agreed with your ideology.  Wiki noted that "After the outbreak, South Korea developed a system to rapidly expand testing capabilities during future disease outbreaks. This has been credited as a reason for South Korea's widespread testing and effective response to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic."

While there was indeed a change in government, South Korea did not abandon their pandemic response protocols in the switch, as Trump did in getting rid of Obama's pandemic planners without naming replacements.

I should note that while Hong Kong too made plans ahead of the pandemic and were considered a success in their initial response, they are very population dense and have a large division of wealth.  Many of their poor live in coffin homes, incredibly small apartments, making attempts at isolation extremely difficult.  Once the disease took hold there, the plans to keep the virus out were bypassed.  Their plans did not include enough testing to isolate an outbreak in the coffin homes, much the same problem that Trump is facing in opening the US without sufficient tests.  Their plans which were initially considered good are now going into another phase where the 'keep it out' strategy gives way to the reality that the disease is already in the population.

The two plans were just different.  Hong Kong depended primarily on closing the borders, on keeping the bug out.  South Korea also planned on testing, that should the bug get in to rapidly detect, trace and isolate.  Either plan can work, but using both plans produces better results.

Of course, Trump prefers to use neither sort of plan.  The virus is obviously already in the country, and the tests are still unavailable.