foreignpolicy--2020-04-02--Africa Meets Pandemic With Violence, Confusion

NAIROBI—The COVID-19 pandemic arrived relatively late to Africa , but the early responses from some African countries have been chaotic and violent , possibly helping to spread the disease .
About 23,000 people fled South Africa on the eve of its lockdown , rushing the border into neighboring Mozambique on March 27 .
In Kenya , among a number of other countries on the continent , security forces have beaten , whipped , humiliated , and even killed civilians , including a 13-year-old boy , in an attempt to enforce curfews , bans on movement , and lockdowns .
Similar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s second-largest city , with armed , uniformed men lining up people and shoving them onto the beds of police pickup trucks or encircling groups of people sitting on the ground .
“ When it comes to the arrests of those ‘ violating ’ regulations not deliberately , we see them packed like sardines in police trucks .
This is sure [ a ] breeding ground for the spreading of the virus , ” said Jestina Mukoko , the national director for the Zimbabwe Peace Project .
“ The police are also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ citizens being assaulted .
We are also worried that the police are at risk of catching the virus because we do not see them in protective clothing .
We wish the police would issue warnings and avoid having too many people in small spaces.
” Many critics say the lockdowns and nighttime curfews recently put in place across Africa the past weeks have prompted unrest and disarray that may only help spread the disease , including mass cross-border migration , state-sponsored violence , and economic strife .
Across Africa , borders and airspaces @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they are treated as an exception , humanitarian agencies are concerned they might not be able to move relief goods in time , and food cuts could also cause people to move .
“ African governments appear to have adopted the lockdown policy without either consultation with the affected people ( I can see no cases in which they have done this ) or analysis of its likely impacts on the trajectory of infections and the livelihoods of people , ” said Alex de Waal , the executive director of the World Peace @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is still trying to figure out what the least harmful approach would be , ” said Emma Naylor-Ngugi , CARE USA ’ s regional director for East , Central , and Southern Africa .
The continent has been late to catch the virus , with the second case in Africa recorded in Algeria only at the end of February .
Currently the only model available to governments in this part of the world is restricting movement , but this has already backfired spectacularly .
As of March 31 , Africa had nearly 5,300 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a big continent , but implementing testing has been slow , making it is possible that the virus has spread further .
After weeks of precious few samples taken , significant shipments of tests and supplies donated by the Chinese billionaire Jack Ma are being distributed across Africa now .
It is expected that with increased testing , numbers will rise ( though the quality of the tests is already being called into question ) .
As test positives are growing , restrictions like lockdowns and dusk-to-dawn curfews are being swiftly put into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and overall chaos unleashed in countries around the continent already as a result of these policies suggest that such measures can be , at best , counterproductive .
That was especially true when thousands of Mozambican miners and farmers rushed over the border after South Africa announced a nationwide , military-patrolled lockdown on March 23 .
“ I ’ m concerned that migration and mobility are not being considered in South Africa ’ s response to COVID-19 .
There has been no coordinated response at the Southern African Development Community level , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ high mobility , is very worrying , ” said Jo Vearey , the director of the African Centre for Migration & Society at the University of the Witwatersrand , Johannesburg .
It is not possible to quantify how many thousands—or hundreds of thousands—of Mozambicans work as miners , farmers , or informally in small businesses , living hand to mouth without contracts in neighboring South Africa .
South Africa has the second-biggest economy on the continent , while Mozambique ranked 180th out of 189 nations on the United Nations Human Development Index .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ work in Gauteng province , in the center of the country , living in townships on the outskirts of the provincial capital , Johannesburg .
Victor Cossa , a Mozambican miner who works in South Africa and is the president of the Association of Mozambican Miners and Farmer Workers in South Africa , estimated that about 35 percent of the 18,000 miners he represents left South Africa .
He told Foreign Policy that when South Africa announced its lockdown , those in the country living in close quarters in hostels sharing a kitchen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
People worried about being able to properly quarantine , that their yearly work permits might expire , and that they wouldn ’ t be able to make money to eat .
They did not want to risk being shut in doors , potentially at the mercy of police raids , or unable to access public health care if they got sick , he said .
Mozambicans working in South Africa have to return home once a year to renew their work papers .
The South African government has said it will not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ three-week lockdown , but Cossa said that information was received after many had left .
He also said that given the living conditions and concern about having money to eat , most would have gone home anyway .
At the moment , South Africa has the most coronavirus cases on the continent by a wide margin with 1,353 , according to the World Health Organization ’ s April 1 situation report .
In total , approximately 23,000 people rushed from South Africa back to Mozambique .
The people who left Gauteng province would @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to reach Ressano Garcia , the main border crossing , before moving across Mozambique to get home .
Maider Mavi , a spokesman for Mozambique ’ s Health Ministry , told Foreign Policy that at the moment , the government is not sure if the 23,000 people who are back in the country are in quarantine .
He said the Health Ministry set up a team at Ressano Garcia after South Africa declared its first case of the coronavirus .
This week , the ministry began making phone calls to follow up on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ everyone who entered is now quarantining .
“ The lockdown has caused problems , but it is a necessary thing that South Africa had to do , ” Mavi said .
Last Friday , the Kenyan government introduced a dusk-to-dawn curfew , unleashing tear gas and summarily beating civilians with batons and whips .
In Mombasa , the country ’ s second-biggest city and port town , police rushed a crowded commuter ferry , forcing a melee of running through tear gas and a flurry of baton slaps , about two hours before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the terrified travelers , they made groups of people lie face down , close together in groups .
Photos show that the police did not take the social distance mandate into consideration as they forced them into clumps .
Human Rights Watch in Kenya said the use of force could impair the government ’ s ability to slow the spread of the disease .
“ The authorities should ensure police respect the law and avoid abusive conduct while enforcing the curfew .
Otherwise , excess use of force could undermine [ the ] @ @ @ @ @ @ @ support and cooperation in an effort to control the spread of the virus , ” a recent Human Rights Watch report argued .
The Kenyan curfew also caused a backlog of traffic , and people trying to get home from city centers ended up sleeping side by side outside , leaning against building walls or on grassy roundabouts .
“ Clearly by limiting movement and thus interaction , a curfew can help slow down the virus .
However , it is unclear what data , if any , the government used to determine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ do so or to support its claim that the virus was mostly spread during the evenings and at night , ” said Patrick Gathara , a Kenyan commentator and analyst .
Neither a National Police Service spokesperson nor a government spokesperson responded to phone calls and messages from Foreign Policy .
Beyond internal national lockdowns and curfews , cross-continent borders and airspaces are largely shuttered , not including the movement of food , cargo , and humanitarian relief .
Even though they are treated as special cases in some areas , aid organizations @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t be able to get food and supplies , given the uneven regulations between countries , or that the extra paperwork required could cause delay .
In South Sudan , for example , where rocky , unpaved roads and insecurity force the movement of almost all relief goods to go by air , with the capital airport closed , humanitarian organizations are concerned about getting protective equipment into the country .
CARE USA ’ s Naylor-Ngugi said that in some places on the continent , mitigation measures like distributing double food rations have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ collapse there will be enough to tide families over for a few weeks .
There ’ s also concern that if there are delays in delivering supplies , especially food , that cuts could then catalyze movement , potentially spreading the disease .
Refugee populations are especially vulnerable in this case .
With approximately 1.5 million , Uganda hosts the largest refugee population in Africa .
The World Food Program ( WFP ) says the outbreak is coinciding with a 30 percent ration cut among refugees beginning in April as a result of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that excess movement could happen soon in the East African country .
“ While understandably meant to stem the spread of the highly contagious and deadly COVID-19 , the countrywide restrictions on movement imposed by the government unfortunately present unintended consequences : They mean that refugees in Uganda will be constrained in farming , working , or doing business to try to fill the food gap as a result of the food cuts and will therefore be at greater risk of both malnutrition and the COVID-19 , ” said El-Khidir Daloum , WFP @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Policy spoke to a “ very irritated ” health practitioner in Zimbabwe who requested to remain anonymous .
“ We snatched the most suppressive solution we could find without training the military , police , or anyone else , ” the practitioner said , pointing out that the police in Zimbabwe could even turn on the state if not provided with protective clothing .
“ This is turning into a chaotic situation .
”

NAIROBI—The COVID-19 pandemic arrived relatively late to Africa, but the early responses from some African countries have been chaotic and violent, possibly helping to spread the disease.
NAIROBI—The COVID-19 pandemic arrived relatively late to Africa, but the early responses from some African countries have been chaotic and violent, possibly helping to spread the disease.
About 23,000 people fled South Africa on the eve of its lockdown, rushing the border into neighboring Mozambique on March 27. In Kenya, among a number of other countries on the continent, security forces have beaten, whipped, humiliated, and even killed civilians, including a 13-year-old boy, in an attempt to enforce curfews, bans on movement, and lockdowns. Similar pictures have emerged from Bulawayo, Zimbabwe’s second-largest city, with armed, uniformed men lining up people and shoving them onto the beds of police pickup trucks or encircling groups of people sitting on the ground.
“When it comes to the arrests of those ‘violating’ regulations not deliberately, we see them packed like sardines in police trucks. This is sure [a] breeding ground for the spreading of the virus,” said Jestina Mukoko, the national director for the Zimbabwe Peace Project. “The police are also being heavy-handed with citizens—we have seen some citizens being assaulted. We are also worried that the police are at risk of catching the virus because we do not see them in protective clothing. We wish the police would issue warnings and avoid having too many people in small spaces.”
Many critics say the lockdowns and nighttime curfews recently put in place across Africa the past weeks have prompted unrest and disarray that may only help spread the disease, including mass cross-border migration, state-sponsored violence, and economic strife. Across Africa, borders and airspaces have mostly closed, and even though they are treated as an exception, humanitarian agencies are concerned they might not be able to move relief goods in time, and food cuts could also cause people to move.
[Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak: Get daily updates on the pandemic and learn how it’s affecting countries around the world.]
“African governments appear to have adopted the lockdown policy without either consultation with the affected people (I can see no cases in which they have done this) or analysis of its likely impacts on the trajectory of infections and the livelihoods of people,” said Alex de Waal, the executive director of the World Peace Foundation at Tufts University.
“Everyone is still trying to figure out what the least harmful approach would be,” said Emma Naylor-Ngugi, CARE USA’s regional director for East, Central, and Southern Africa.
The continent has been late to catch the virus, with the second case in Africa recorded in Algeria only at the end of February. Currently the only model available to governments in this part of the world is restricting movement, but this has already backfired spectacularly.
As of March 31, Africa had nearly 5,300 coronavirus cases, a small number for a big continent, but implementing testing has been slow, making it is possible that the virus has spread further. After weeks of precious few samples taken, significant shipments of tests and supplies donated by the Chinese billionaire Jack Ma are being distributed across Africa now. It is expected that with increased testing, numbers will rise (though the quality of the tests is already being called into question).
As test positives are growing, restrictions like lockdowns and dusk-to-dawn curfews are being swiftly put into place. The mass movement, brutality, and overall chaos unleashed in countries around the continent already as a result of these policies suggest that such measures can be, at best, counterproductive. That was especially true when thousands of Mozambican miners and farmers rushed over the border after South Africa announced a nationwide, military-patrolled lockdown on March 23.
“I’m concerned that migration and mobility are not being considered in South Africa’s response to COVID-19. There has been no coordinated response at the Southern African Development Community level, which, for a region of such high mobility, is very worrying,” said Jo Vearey, the director of the African Centre for Migration & Society at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.
It is not possible to quantify how many thousands—or hundreds of thousands—of Mozambicans work as miners, farmers, or informally in small businesses, living hand to mouth without contracts in neighboring South Africa. South Africa has the second-biggest economy on the continent, while Mozambique ranked 180th out of 189 nations on the United Nations Human Development Index. Many of the Mozambicans in South Africa work in Gauteng province, in the center of the country, living in townships on the outskirts of the provincial capital, Johannesburg.
Victor Cossa, a Mozambican miner who works in South Africa and is the president of the Association of Mozambican Miners and Farmer Workers in South Africa, estimated that about 35 percent of the 18,000 miners he represents left South Africa. He told Foreign Policy that when South Africa announced its lockdown, those in the country living in close quarters in hostels sharing a kitchen or on temporary permits decided to leave. People worried about being able to properly quarantine, that their yearly work permits might expire, and that they wouldn’t be able to make money to eat. They did not want to risk being shut in doors, potentially at the mercy of police raids, or unable to access public health care if they got sick, he said.
Mozambicans working in South Africa have to return home once a year to renew their work papers. The South African government has said it will not prosecute people whose papers expire during the three-week lockdown, but Cossa said that information was received after many had left. He also said that given the living conditions and concern about having money to eat, most would have gone home anyway.
At the moment, South Africa has the most coronavirus cases on the continent by a wide margin with 1,353, according to the World Health Organization’s April 1 situation report. In total, approximately 23,000 people rushed from South Africa back to Mozambique. The people who left Gauteng province would have already traveled approximately 250 miles just to reach Ressano Garcia, the main border crossing, before moving across Mozambique to get home.
Maider Mavi, a spokesman for Mozambique’s Health Ministry, told Foreign Policy that at the moment, the government is not sure if the 23,000 people who are back in the country are in quarantine. He said the Health Ministry set up a team at Ressano Garcia after South Africa declared its first case of the coronavirus. This week, the ministry began making phone calls to follow up on the list of 23,000 to make sure everyone who entered is now quarantining.
“The lockdown has caused problems, but it is a necessary thing that South Africa had to do,” Mavi said.
Last Friday, the Kenyan government introduced a dusk-to-dawn curfew, unleashing tear gas and summarily beating civilians with batons and whips.
In Mombasa, the country’s second-biggest city and port town, police rushed a crowded commuter ferry, forcing a melee of running through tear gas and a flurry of baton slaps, about two hours before the curfew even commenced. To corral the terrified travelers, they made groups of people lie face down, close together in groups. Photos show that the police did not take the social distance mandate into consideration as they forced them into clumps.
Human Rights Watch in Kenya said the use of force could impair the government’s ability to slow the spread of the disease. “The authorities should ensure police respect the law and avoid abusive conduct while enforcing the curfew. Otherwise, excess use of force could undermine [the] government’s ability to win popular support and cooperation in an effort to control the spread of the virus,” a recent Human Rights Watch report argued.
The Kenyan curfew also caused a backlog of traffic, and people trying to get home from city centers ended up sleeping side by side outside, leaning against building walls or on grassy roundabouts.
“Clearly by limiting movement and thus interaction, a curfew can help slow down the virus. However, it is unclear what data, if any, the government used to determine this was the most effective means to do so or to support its claim that the virus was mostly spread during the evenings and at night,” said Patrick Gathara, a Kenyan commentator and analyst.
Neither a National Police Service spokesperson nor a government spokesperson responded to phone calls and messages from Foreign Policy.
Beyond internal national lockdowns and curfews, cross-continent borders and airspaces are largely shuttered, not including the movement of food, cargo, and humanitarian relief. Even though they are treated as special cases in some areas, aid organizations have expressed concerns that they won’t be able to get food and supplies, given the uneven regulations between countries, or that the extra paperwork required could cause delay.
In South Sudan, for example, where rocky, unpaved roads and insecurity force the movement of almost all relief goods to go by air, with the capital airport closed, humanitarian organizations are concerned about getting protective equipment into the country.
CARE USA’s Naylor-Ngugi said that in some places on the continent, mitigation measures like distributing double food rations have been proposed so that if supply chains collapse there will be enough to tide families over for a few weeks.
There’s also concern that if there are delays in delivering supplies, especially food, that cuts could then catalyze movement, potentially spreading the disease.
Refugee populations are especially vulnerable in this case. With approximately 1.5 million, Uganda hosts the largest refugee population in Africa. The World Food Program (WFP) says the outbreak is coinciding with a 30 percent ration cut among refugees beginning in April as a result of a $137 million funding shortfall and that excess movement could happen soon in the East African country.
“While understandably meant to stem the spread of the highly contagious and deadly COVID-19, the countrywide restrictions on movement imposed by the government unfortunately present unintended consequences: They mean that refugees in Uganda will be constrained in farming, working, or doing business to try to fill the food gap as a result of the food cuts and will therefore be at greater risk of both malnutrition and the COVID-19,” said El-Khidir Daloum, WFP’s Uganda country director.
Foreign Policy spoke to a “very irritated” health practitioner in Zimbabwe who requested to remain anonymous.
“We snatched the most suppressive solution we could find without training the military, police, or anyone else,” the practitioner said, pointing out that the police in Zimbabwe could even turn on the state if not provided with protective clothing. “This is turning into a chaotic situation.”


foreignpolicy--2020-04-02--Confucianism Isn’t Helping Beat the Coronavirus

As COVID-19 ravages the United States and Europe , South Korea ’ s response to the pandemic is earning praises from around the world .
The unmatched scale and efficiency of the country ’ s test-and-quarantine scheme allowed South Korea to stop the coronavirus in its tracks , pushing down the number of new cases to around 100 a day from a peak of around 900 new cases a day in late February .
In addition to Korea ’ s testing capacity , the international media has marveled at its drive-thru testing facilities , detailed tracking of the movements of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the public , which buys the same amount of toilet paper as before .
Perhaps inevitably , some media have offered reductive cultural explanations for this success .
A common trope is that Koreans are less individualistic , more community-oriented , and more willing to sacrifice for the greater good .
A New York Times article , for example , claimed : “ Social trust is higher in South Korea than in many other countries , particularly Western democracies beset by polarization and populist backlash.
” An analysis in the Wall Street @ @ @ @ @ @ @ imprint of Confucianism gives a paternalistic state a freer hand to intrude in people ’ s lives during an emergency.
” Several analysts offered that freedom-loving Westerners would not accept South Korea ’ s contact tracing , as the Western public would not accept the invasion of privacy that detailed every location they visited while carrying the virus .
This is nonsense , and it repeats the same mistake that allowed the rampant coronavirus outbreaks in the United States and Europe in the first place : the mistake of seeing Asia as an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ different from the West that no knowledge or experience is transferable .
The United States and Europe are suffering from COVID-19 because they saw the virus as an “ Asian disease , ” somehow unable to reach their own shores .
Now , they run the risk of rejecting the best practices of combating the pandemic as they imagine “ Asian solutions ” that can never be replicated in their countries .
[ Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak : Get daily updates on the pandemic and learn how it ’ s affecting countries around @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not at all the communitarian-spirited society of the kind that Americans like to imagine .
This is a long-standing pattern of Orientalism .
Whenever a social policy seems to work well in an Asian country ( usually Japan and more recently South Korea ) , Westerners—Americans in particular—are quick to claim that such policy was possible only because of Asia ’ s supposedly homogenous populations and harmonious societies .
Such harmony , however , exists only in a racist fantasy that imagines a society made up of meek , compliant Asians .
South @ @ @ @ @ @ @ all the communitarian-spirited society of the kind that Americans like to imagine .
In a 2018 study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development , South Korea ’ s score for “ average trust in others ” was merely 0.32 in 2014 .
The country was outranked by such so-called individualistic Western societies as Norway ( 0.68 ) , Sweden ( 0.65 ) , the Netherlands ( 0.54 ) , Canada ( 0.44 ) , and even the United States ( 0.41 ) .
The contemporary trend of acrimonious , polarized politics @ @ @ @ @ @ @ skip South Korea .
If anything , South Korea was at the forefront of that trend , as the country adopted high-speed internet on a mass scale earlier than virtually any country in the world .
Before America knew what YouTube was , South Korea was already dealing with the negative implications of an online society , such as cyberbullying and misinformation campaigns .
Years before Russian intelligence intervened in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and the Brexit referendum , conservative South Korean presidents were using their own spy agencies to post millions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Even during the coronavirus pandemic , South Korea ’ s politics have remained as fractious as ever .
One egregious episode was the row involving the panel of medical experts advising the president .
The Korean Medical Association ( KMA ) , an interest group that represents doctors in South Korea , has long been critical of liberal President Moon Jae-in , who in its view expanded the coverage of South Korea ’ s national health insurance to the doctors ’ detriment .
As COVID-19 was reaching its peak in South Korea in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ president of the KMA ( and a founder of a fascist group that purported to be the heir of the groups that massacred civilians during the Korean War ) , demanded that the Moon administration sack the health and welfare minister and the presidential advisory panel .
To acquiesce to the KMA and protect its members from political attacks , the panel decided to voluntarily disband .
In the middle of the most serious global pandemic in a century , South Korea ’ s politics caused the nation ’ s foremost experts in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Of course , culture is a real thing that guides people ’ s actions .
It is entirely possible to have a sophisticated debate on , for example , how Confucianism influenced the South Korean public ’ s reception of the government ’ s response to the coronavirus .
( The ancient Confucian philosopher Mencius provides rich material on practical governance in accordance with the Confucian web of obligations between ruler and subject . )
But curiously , the Western media ’ s discussion of South Korea ’ s Confucian heritage never @ @ @ @ @ @ @ texts .
Instead , Confucianism is merely an excuse to introduce tired old stereotypes about Asians as mindless drones , ignorant to the true meaning of freedom .
As the pandemic rages across the West , the discussion about “ Eastern culture ” is not turning out to be an attempt to enlighten but a search for an excuse to remain benighted .
Ultimately , South Korea ’ s success is thanks to competent leadership that inspired public trust .
No sacred Confucian text advised Korean health officials to summon medical companies and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ when Korea had only four known cases of COVID-19 .
No Asian wisdom made Korean doctors think they should test everyone with pneumonia symptoms regardless of travel history , which led to the discovery of the now infamous “ Patient 31 ” and the suppression of the massive coronavirus cluster in the city of Daegu caused by the secretive Shincheonji cult .
The South Korean public isn ’ t hoarding toilet paper not because they are sheep with no individual agency but because they plainly saw that their government was committed to being @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their interest .
We can debate the extent to which Korea ’ s culture played a role in each of these developments , but make no mistake : There is nothing in any country ’ s culture that prevents any of these responses .
It is absurd to suggest , for example , that Americans and Europeans would never submit to the type of high-tech contact tracing that South Korea has implemented , when millions of them voluntarily give up their personal data to the likes of Google and Facebook every day .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ already using mobile ad location data to study the spread of the coronavirus . )
No one should be so thickheaded as to claim that the Western notion of freedom compels doing nothing against a viral outbreak that is projected to cause hundreds of thousands of deaths or that a nationwide lockdown is somehow more consistent with the notion of freedom than a proper quarantine of individual patients that allows the rest of the society to carry on .
Although COVID-19 originated from China , Europe and the United States are facing the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to take the virus seriously .
The Western world was too preoccupied with deriding China ’ s inept and opaque response and abetting anti-Asian racism to understand that soon Asia ’ s problem would be its problem too .
( One Italian health official admitted that Italy saw the outbreak in China as a “ science fiction movie that had nothing to do with us.
” ) Just as South Korea did , the United States and Europe could have moved in the earliest stage of the outbreak to implement a mass-scale test-and-quarantine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coronavirus .
By writing off South Korea ’ s response as culturally bound , the West is once again making the same mistake , failing to recognize that Asia ’ s solution could be its solution too .

As COVID-19 ravages the United States and Europe, South Korea’s response to the pandemic is earning praises from around the world. The unmatched scale and efficiency of the country’s test-and-quarantine scheme allowed South Korea to stop the coronavirus in its tracks, pushing down the number of new cases to around 100 a day from a peak of around 900 new cases a day in late February. In addition to Korea’s testing capacity, the international media has marveled at its drive-thru testing facilities, detailed tracking of the movements of coronavirus patients, and the calm response of the public, which buys the same amount of toilet paper as before.
As COVID-19 ravages the United States and Europe, South Korea’s response to the pandemic is earning praises from around the world. The unmatched scale and efficiency of the country’s test-and-quarantine scheme allowed South Korea to stop the coronavirus in its tracks, pushing down the number of new cases to around 100 a day from a peak of around 900 new cases a day in late February. In addition to Korea’s testing capacity, the international media has marveled at its drive-thru testing facilities, detailed tracking of the movements of coronavirus patients, and the calm response of the public, which buys the same amount of toilet paper as before.
Perhaps inevitably, some media have offered reductive cultural explanations for this success. A common trope is that Koreans are less individualistic, more community-oriented, and more willing to sacrifice for the greater good. A New York Times article, for example, claimed: “Social trust is higher in South Korea than in many other countries, particularly Western democracies beset by polarization and populist backlash.” An analysis in the Wall Street Journal said that “the lingering cultural imprint of Confucianism gives a paternalistic state a freer hand to intrude in people’s lives during an emergency.” Several analysts offered that freedom-loving Westerners would not accept South Korea’s contact tracing, as the Western public would not accept the invasion of privacy that detailed every location they visited while carrying the virus.
This is nonsense, and it repeats the same mistake that allowed the rampant coronavirus outbreaks in the United States and Europe in the first place: the mistake of seeing Asia as an unrelatable other, a place so fundamentally different from the West that no knowledge or experience is transferable. The United States and Europe are suffering from COVID-19 because they saw the virus as an “Asian disease,” somehow unable to reach their own shores. Now, they run the risk of rejecting the best practices of combating the pandemic as they imagine “Asian solutions” that can never be replicated in their countries.
[Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak: Get daily updates on the pandemic and learn how it’s affecting countries around the world.]
South Korea is not at all the communitarian-spirited society of the kind that Americans like to imagine.
This is a long-standing pattern of Orientalism. Whenever a social policy seems to work well in an Asian country (usually Japan and more recently South Korea), Westerners—Americans in particular—are quick to claim that such policy was possible only because of Asia’s supposedly homogenous populations and harmonious societies. Such harmony, however, exists only in a racist fantasy that imagines a society made up of meek, compliant Asians. South Korea, specifically, is not at all the communitarian-spirited society of the kind that Americans like to imagine. In a 2018 study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, South Korea’s score for “average trust in others” was merely 0.32 in 2014. The country was outranked by such so-called individualistic Western societies as Norway (0.68), Sweden (0.65), the Netherlands (0.54), Canada (0.44), and even the United States (0.41).
The contemporary trend of acrimonious, polarized politics supercharged by the internet didn’t skip South Korea. If anything, South Korea was at the forefront of that trend, as the country adopted high-speed internet on a mass scale earlier than virtually any country in the world. Before America knew what YouTube was, South Korea was already dealing with the negative implications of an online society, such as cyberbullying and misinformation campaigns. Years before Russian intelligence intervened in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and the Brexit referendum, conservative South Korean presidents were using their own spy agencies to post millions of fake tweets to skew elections.
Even during the coronavirus pandemic, South Korea’s politics have remained as fractious as ever. One egregious episode was the row involving the panel of medical experts advising the president. The Korean Medical Association (KMA), an interest group that represents doctors in South Korea, has long been critical of liberal President Moon Jae-in, who in its view expanded the coverage of South Korea’s national health insurance to the doctors’ detriment. As COVID-19 was reaching its peak in South Korea in late February, Choi Dae-jip, the president of the KMA (and a founder of a fascist group that purported to be the heir of the groups that massacred civilians during the Korean War), demanded that the Moon administration sack the health and welfare minister and the presidential advisory panel. To acquiesce to the KMA and protect its members from political attacks, the panel decided to voluntarily disband. In the middle of the most serious global pandemic in a century, South Korea’s politics caused the nation’s foremost experts in infectious disease to cease advising the president.
Of course, culture is a real thing that guides people’s actions. It is entirely possible to have a sophisticated debate on, for example, how Confucianism influenced the South Korean public’s reception of the government’s response to the coronavirus. (The ancient Confucian philosopher Mencius provides rich material on practical governance in accordance with the Confucian web of obligations between ruler and subject.) But curiously, the Western media’s discussion of South Korea’s Confucian heritage never makes any reference to the actual Confucian texts. Instead, Confucianism is merely an excuse to introduce tired old stereotypes about Asians as mindless drones, ignorant to the true meaning of freedom. As the pandemic rages across the West, the discussion about “Eastern culture” is not turning out to be an attempt to enlighten but a search for an excuse to remain benighted.
Ultimately, South Korea’s success is thanks to competent leadership that inspired public trust. No sacred Confucian text advised Korean health officials to summon medical companies and told them to ramp up testing capacity when Korea had only four known cases of COVID-19. No Asian wisdom made Korean doctors think they should test everyone with pneumonia symptoms regardless of travel history, which led to the discovery of the now infamous “Patient 31” and the suppression of the massive coronavirus cluster in the city of Daegu caused by the secretive Shincheonji cult. The South Korean public isn’t hoarding toilet paper not because they are sheep with no individual agency but because they plainly saw that their government was committed to being transparent and trusted it to act in their interest.
We can debate the extent to which Korea’s culture played a role in each of these developments, but make no mistake: There is nothing in any country’s culture that prevents any of these responses. It is absurd to suggest, for example, that Americans and Europeans would never submit to the type of high-tech contact tracing that South Korea has implemented, when millions of them voluntarily give up their personal data to the likes of Google and Facebook every day. (Indeed, the U.S. government is already using mobile ad location data to study the spread of the coronavirus.) No one should be so thickheaded as to claim that the Western notion of freedom compels doing nothing against a viral outbreak that is projected to cause hundreds of thousands of deaths or that a nationwide lockdown is somehow more consistent with the notion of freedom than a proper quarantine of individual patients that allows the rest of the society to carry on.
Although COVID-19 originated from China, Europe and the United States are facing the brunt of the pandemic because they failed to take the virus seriously. The Western world was too preoccupied with deriding China’s inept and opaque response and abetting anti-Asian racism to understand that soon Asia’s problem would be its problem too. (One Italian health official admitted that Italy saw the outbreak in China as a “science fiction movie that had nothing to do with us.”) Just as South Korea did, the United States and Europe could have moved in the earliest stage of the outbreak to implement a mass-scale test-and-quarantine program and minimize the damages of the coronavirus. By writing off South Korea’s response as culturally bound, the West is once again making the same mistake, failing to recognize that Asia’s solution could be its solution too.


foreignpolicy--2020-04-02--Trump Just Missed a Perfect Opportunity to Reassert American Leadership

Last week , U.S. President Donald Trump missed an opportunity to establish the United States as a global leader in the coronavirus crisis .
At the March 26 virtual summit of the G-20 , the leaders of 19 of the world ’ s most powerful nations plus the European Union met by videoconference to lay out a global response to the pandemic .
The result was a bland statement that did little more than outline measures that individual countries were already taking to deal with the crisis .
G-20 leaders pledged to “ do whatever it takes ” and “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ further action that may be required.
” But aside from some additional funding for the World Health Organization and a directive for health and finance ministers to talk separately , the summit yielded no substantive new commitments .
It was a missed chance for the G-20—a forum created precisely to respond to crises such as these , but which has largely served as a photo opportunity for leaders and an occasion for long-winded communiquesThe G-20 was created to respond to crises such as these , but has largely served as a photo opportunity @ @ @ @ @ @ @ communiques .
that reaffirm existing commitments and pledge future cooperation .
Even more , last week ’ s summit was another forgone chance for the United States to provide global leadership by helping to drive a coordinated response .
Without U.S. leadership , efforts to contain the spread of the virus and mitigate its global economic impacts are destined to fall short .
The G-20 , after all , was set up to deal with global crises requiring dramatic action by the world ’ s most powerful developed and developing countries , which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ GDP and two-thirds of the world ’ s population .
During the global financial crisis in 2008—within weeks of the collapse of Lehman Brothers—the leaders of China , Russia , India , Brazil , and other rising powers joined those from established democracies for the first G-20 summit in Washington , D.C .
They agreed to cooperate on monetary policy , stimulate economic growth , and develop a framework for regulatory reform to prevent future financial crises .
And it was during another virus outbreak—Ebola—that the G-20 catalyzed immediate and concrete action to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ At their 2014 meeting in Brisbane , Australia , G-20 leaders committed to provide medicine and equipment , send trained medical teams to West Africa , and establish a fund to assist poor countries in containing the deadly epidemic .
The G-20 ’ s responses to crises in 2008 and 2014 stand in stark contrast to what we are witnessing today .
Government actions to stem the spread of the virus—closing borders , restricting travel , shutting down businesses—have been largely uncoordinated , limiting their effectiveness in spreading a disease that knows no @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the global economy and supply chains .
Why the widely different responses ?
One need not look further than the role of the United States .
Under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama , Washington took the lead in mobilizing collective action , using its power and influence to get other G-20 governments to commit to necessary action .
But thus far in the current crisis , the United States has failed to step up to the plate .
Driven by his disdain for alliances and multilateralism , Trump has downplayed or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , limiting his administration ’ s efforts to fight the coronavirus pandemic to the U.S. border .
With coronavirus cases surging in the United States and needed medical supplies in short supply , the administration has struggled to lead an effective response at home , let alone lead or cooperate abroad.The administration has struggled to lead an effective response at home , let alone lead or cooperate abroad .
As a result , the global response to the coronavirus has been for every nation to fend for itself—the opposite of what a forum @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and more like the “ G-Zero ” world some have contemplated to describe the power vacuum that results when no nation is able or willing to assume the mantle of leadership .
Global action is self-evidently needed , and managing a response to a global pandemic is precisely the type of activity for which the G-20 was created .
So what should the G-20 do ?
First , it should move quickly to establish a framework for cooperation on mitigation and suppression measures .
To effectively contain the virus and manage the widely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to better coordinate the implementation of lockdowns , travel restrictions , testing and screening at airports , and the eventual reopening of national borders .
At the same , G-20 governments must follow through on last week ’ s promise to increase funding for WHO and to commit to allowing health monitors to access impacted regions in order to ensure transparency .
Second , the G-20 should help coordinate the allocation of critical medical equipment , including masks and ventilators , which are running in short supply around the globe .
With the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ line , leaders at national , regional , and local levels have been forced to compete with one another to gain access to these scarce supplies , driving up prices in a bidding war .
As production is ramped up , the G-20 should develop guidelines to ensure a rational system for prioritizing access and distribution of these items , particularly as the virus spreads to less developed nations .
Finally , the G-20 should specify joint actions its members will take to reduce the economic impact of the crisis .
Leaders need @ @ @ @ @ @ @ take steps to increase lending capacity .
As Kevin Rudd , the former Australian prime minister , recently noted , “ Global confidence will recover only when both the public and markets see that governments collectively have stepped into the breach.
” While the G-20 can and should play an important role , democracies will also need to turn to other forums and organizations where they can work more closely with like-minded partners .
This holds especially for areas where cooperation with China and Russia will prove difficult.Democracies will also need to turn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more closely with like-minded partners , especially in areas where cooperation with China and Russia will prove difficult .
The G-7 , for example , can help facilitate joint research on vaccine development and coordinate production of scarce medical supplies , both of which will require a significant degree of technical and industrial cooperation , including better control over critical supply chains .
The G7 can also take action to counter Beijing ’ s disinformation campaign about the source of the virus .
Another useful grouping could be the D-10 gathering of democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ South Korea , Australia , and the European Union .
Others have called on NATO to play a stronger role in fostering trans-Atlantic cooperation on this crisis .
But even these venues will not be of much value if the United States fails to lead , as demonstrated by the recent stalemate among the foreign ministers of the G-7 on a joint statement regarding the pandemic , reportedly because of U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo ’ s insistence that the document include a reference to the “ Wuhan virus.
” As the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the world , a coordinated response among the world ’ s leading powers is becoming ever more urgent .
Effective action , in the G-20 or any other forum , will require real leadership from the United States .
That , too , is an uncertain prospect in these troubled times .

Last week, U.S. President Donald Trump missed an opportunity to establish the United States as a global leader in the coronavirus crisis. At the March 26 virtual summit of the G-20, the leaders of 19 of the world’s most powerful nations plus the European Union met by videoconference to lay out a global response to the pandemic. The result was a bland statement that did little more than outline measures that individual countries were already taking to deal with the crisis. G-20 leaders pledged to “do whatever it takes” and “stand ready” to “take any further action that may be required.” But aside from some additional funding for the World Health Organization and a directive for health and finance ministers to talk separately, the summit yielded no substantive new commitments.
Last week, U.S. President Donald Trump missed an opportunity to establish the United States as a global leader in the coronavirus crisis. At the March 26 virtual summit of the G-20, the leaders of 19 of the world’s most powerful nations plus the European Union met by videoconference to lay out a global response to the pandemic. The result was a bland statement that did little more than outline measures that individual countries were already taking to deal with the crisis. G-20 leaders pledged to “do whatever it takes” and “stand ready” to “take any further action that may be required.” But aside from some additional funding for the World Health Organization and a directive for health and finance ministers to talk separately, the summit yielded no substantive new commitments.
It was a missed chance for the G-20—a forum created precisely to respond to crises such as these, but which has largely served as a photo opportunity for leaders and an occasion for long-winded communiques that reaffirm existing commitments and pledge future cooperation. Even more, last week’s summit was another forgone chance for the United States to provide global leadership by helping to drive a coordinated response. Without U.S. leadership, efforts to contain the spread of the virus and mitigate its global economic impacts are destined to fall short.
The G-20, after all, was set up to deal with global crises requiring dramatic action by the world’s most powerful developed and developing countries, which together account for 90 percent of global GDP and two-thirds of the world’s population. During the global financial crisis in 2008—within weeks of the collapse of Lehman Brothers—the leaders of China, Russia, India, Brazil, and other rising powers joined those from established democracies for the first G-20 summit in Washington, D.C. They agreed to cooperate on monetary policy, stimulate economic growth, and develop a framework for regulatory reform to prevent future financial crises.
And it was during another virus outbreak—Ebola—that the G-20 catalyzed immediate and concrete action to help contain a potentially catastrophic crisis. At their 2014 meeting in Brisbane, Australia, G-20 leaders committed to provide medicine and equipment, send trained medical teams to West Africa, and establish a fund to assist poor countries in containing the deadly epidemic.
[Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak: Get daily updates on the pandemic and learn how it’s affecting countries around the world.]
The G-20’s responses to crises in 2008 and 2014 stand in stark contrast to what we are witnessing today. Government actions to stem the spread of the virus—closing borders, restricting travel, shutting down businesses—have been largely uncoordinated, limiting their effectiveness in spreading a disease that knows no borders, and exacerbating its impacts on the global economy and supply chains.
Why the widely different responses? One need not look further than the role of the United States. Under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, Washington took the lead in mobilizing collective action, using its power and influence to get other G-20 governments to commit to necessary action. But thus far in the current crisis, the United States has failed to step up to the plate. Driven by his disdain for alliances and multilateralism, Trump has downplayed or even ignored the need for global coordination, limiting his administration’s efforts to fight the coronavirus pandemic to the U.S. border. With coronavirus cases surging in the United States and needed medical supplies in short supply, the administration has struggled to lead an effective response at home, let alone lead or cooperate abroad.The administration has struggled to lead an effective response at home, let alone lead or cooperate abroad.
As a result, the global response to the coronavirus has been for every nation to fend for itself—the opposite of what a forum such as the G-20 stands for, and more like the “G-Zero” world described by the political scientist Ian Bremmer, in which no nation is able or willing to assume the mantle of leadership.
Global action is self-evidently needed, and managing a response to a global pandemic is precisely the type of activity for which the G-20 was created. So what should the G-20 do?
First, it should move quickly to establish a framework for cooperation on mitigation and suppression measures. To effectively contain the virus and manage the widely expected secondary outbreaks, G-20 leaders need to better coordinate the implementation of lockdowns, travel restrictions, testing and screening at airports, and the eventual reopening of national borders. At the same, G-20 governments must follow through on last week’s promise to increase funding for WHO and to commit to allowing health monitors to access impacted regions in order to ensure transparency.
Second, the G-20 should help coordinate the allocation of critical medical equipment, including masks and ventilators, which are running in short supply around the globe. With the lives of medical first responders on the line, leaders at national, regional, and local levels have been forced to compete with one another to gain access to these scarce supplies, driving up prices in a bidding war. As production is ramped up, the G-20 should develop guidelines to ensure a rational system for prioritizing access and distribution of these items, particularly as the virus spreads to less developed nations.
Finally, the G-20 should specify joint actions its members will take to reduce the economic impact of the crisis. Leaders need to implement coordinated fiscal stimulus measures and take steps to increase lending capacity. As Kevin Rudd, the former Australian prime minister, recently noted, “Global confidence will recover only when both the public and markets see that governments collectively have stepped into the breach.”
While the G-20 can and should play an important role, democracies will also need to turn to other forums and organizations where they can work more closely with like-minded partners. This holds especially for areas where cooperation with China and Russia will prove difficult.Democracies will also need to turn to other forums where they can work more closely with like-minded partners, especially in areas where cooperation with China and Russia will prove difficult. The G-7, for example, can help facilitate joint research on vaccine development and coordinate production of scarce medical supplies, both of which will require a significant degree of technical and industrial cooperation, including better control over critical supply chains. The G7 can also take action to counter Beijing’s disinformation campaign about the source of the virus. Another useful grouping could be the D-10 gathering of democratic nations, which expands the G-7 by South Korea, Australia, and the European Union. Others have called on NATO to play a stronger role in fostering trans-Atlantic cooperation on this crisis. But even these venues will not be of much value if the United States fails to lead, as demonstrated by the recent stalemate among the foreign ministers of the G-7 on a joint statement regarding the pandemic, reportedly because of U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s insistence that the document include a reference to the “Wuhan virus.”
As the coronavirus pandemic continues to wreak havoc around the world, a coordinated response among the world’s leading powers is becoming ever more urgent. Effective action, in the G-20 or any other forum, will require real leadership from the United States. That, too, is an uncertain prospect in these troubled times.


foreignpolicy--2020-04-02--The Countries That Are Succeeding at Flattening the Curve

The Countries That Are Succeeding at Flattening the Curve The United States is now an epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic , with epidemiological models publicized on Tuesday suggesting the disease could infect millions of Americans in the coming months , killing between 100,000 and 240,000 .
Hospitals in the state of New York , where there are more than 75,000 confirmed cases , are already overwhelmed and experiencing shortages of critical medical equipment such as ventilators and protective gear .
The grim projections indicate that the virus has not reached its peak and that the situation will get worse .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump and other world leaders have faced criticism for their slow and ineffective response since it became clear that the coronavirus would not be contained to China , where it originated .
Other countries such as Taiwan , Singapore , and South Korea have been heralded as relative success stories for flattening the curve before infection rates soared exponentially .
As countries brace for a monthslong crisis , we ’ ve collected our top reads and interviews from recent weeks on how governments and citizens around the world have responded to the threat @ @ @ @ @ @ @ its first case of the coronavirus on Jan. 21 , but it has managed to keep its number of confirmed cases to just 329 with five deaths as of April 1 .
The country is effectively locked out of the World Health Organization ( WHO ) , since membership is usually only accorded to countries that are members of the United Nations , which does not recognize Taiwan .
But as Hilton Yip wrote on March 16 , the government sprang into action as soon as news broke about a mysterious illness in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 100 miles from mainland China , began inspecting travelers coming from the city on Dec. 31 , set up a system to track those in self-quarantine , and ramped up production of medical equipment in January .
( Taiwan has not yet resumed exports of the supplies , including surgical face masks . )
Yip attributed Taiwan ’ s early and effective response to past experience .
“ Given that Taiwan has faced everything from its giant neighbor—the spreading of fake news , military threats , the withholding of vital medical information during @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it must be on its fullest guard whenever any major problem emerges in China , ” he wrote .
[ Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak : Get daily updates on the pandemic and learn how it ’ s affecting countries around the world . ]
South Korea , which had one of the largest initial outbreaks outside China , also managed to slow the spread of new coronavirus cases without instituting any lockdowns .
Devi Sridhar argued on March 23 that the country ’ s exemplary model for mass diagnostic testing was the only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ countries should look to East Asia for lessons .
South Korea , which has a population of 51 million , tests more than 20,000 people daily at designated testing sites and uses isolation and widespread contact tracing to break chains of transmission—as recommended by WHO .
“ South Korea is showing how this model ultimately pays off in reducing spread , taking pressure off health services , and keeping its death rate one of the lowest in the world , ” Sridhar wrote .
In the West , Canada managed to roll out @ @ @ @ @ @ @ States , as Justin Ling wrote on March 13 .
In January and February , Canada began setting up the infrastructure to conduct tests and contact tracing .
The early response in part came from the country ’ s experience during the SARS outbreak in 2003 .
( Then , Canada was the only country outside Asia to report deaths from the virus . )
Canada has a well-funded public health care system , and its criteria for who can be tested for COVID-19 is not as limited as in the United States @ @ @ @ @ @ @ two decades preparing for this moment , ” Ling wrote .
“ By catching cases early , and investigating their origins , Canada has blunted the impact of the virus thus far.
” Some success stories are unexpected .
On the Don ’ t Touch Your Face podcast , Foreign Policy ’ s Amy Mackinnon singled out the early response of the country of Georgia .
Despite its small size and struggling economy , the country began taking serious measures at the end of February , including closing schools and conducting widespread diagnostic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 117 cases and no deaths from COVID-19 .
“ I think the fact that the government took it seriously from the very start has helped , ” the Georgian journalist Natalia Antelava told Mackinnon .
So has Georgia ’ s mindset .
“ This is a country that is used to crisis , and it is a country that has lived through civil wars and the Russian invasion in 2008 and a very dark period through the ’ 90s after the collapse of the Soviet Union , ” Antelava said .
Mackinnon also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Iceland , which has one of the highest per capita rates of confirmed coronavirus cases .
That ’ s because it has also tested more people per capita than anywhere else in the world—an effort led by a private medical research company based in Reykjavik .
The research will be used to inform the global response to the pandemic .
“ What that gives us in Iceland is somewhat of a clearer picture of how the virus is spreading through the general population , ” Ciric said .
“ Our growth has not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ measures of quarantining people who have likely been exposed to the virus.
” Throughout Europe , many countries are under lockdown—but not Sweden , which has remained stoic amid its high-risk outbreak .
The country has reported 4,947 cases , but its government is betting that its distinctive high trust culture means that individuals will act responsibly without being ordered to do so , wrote Nathalie Rothschild on March 24 , reporting from Stockholm .
“ [ T ] here is an expectation that citizens will conform , that they will take personal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ home , keep a distance on public transport , and so on , without being strong-armed into doing so , ” she wrote .
The next two weeks could reveal whether that is a precarious calculation .
Elsewhere , citizens are not so trusting of their governments ’ expertise .
In Russia , daily life continued as normal until mid-March , when medical experts began questioning official statistics showing a low rate of COVID-19 infection .
The government moved quickly to close the borders and announce a large economic stimulus plan , wrote @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reporting from Moscow .
“ Should the true scope of the virus prove to be higher than shown in official statistics , it would mean that the Russian government has missed its chance to slow the pandemic , ” he wrote .
Two weeks later , it appears that the coronavirus could present a serious political challenge for President Vladimir Putin , as Standish reported on March 30 .
There is also significant doubt about the statistics in Iran , which officially reports 47,593 coronavirus cases and 3,036 deaths as of April 1 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ much higher—making Iran a coronavirus epicenter , Maysam Behravesh argues .
As cases climbed in China in January , Iranian officials didn ’ t restrict travel between the countries and apparently delayed announcing an outbreak in the religious city of Qom until after the first COVID-19 deaths .
Many high-ranking figures have since died from the virus .
Behravesh attributes Iran ’ s failed response in part to misunderstanding .
“ Iran ’ s general neglect of the colossal public health threat posed by the coronavirus also emanates from its fundamental unfamiliarity with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” he writes .
“ After all , the virus isn ’ t a domestic revolt or foreign intervention aimed at regime change , but a creeping , invisible menace against the whole society that requires a science-centered response .
”

The United States is now an epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic, with epidemiological models publicized on Tuesday suggesting the disease could infect millions of Americans in the coming months, killing between 100,000 and 240,000. Hospitals in the state of New York, where there are more than 75,000 confirmed cases, are already overwhelmed and experiencing shortages of critical medical equipment such as ventilators and protective gear. The grim projections indicate that the virus has not reached its peak and that the situation will get worse.
The United States is now an epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic, with epidemiological models publicized on Tuesday suggesting the disease could infect millions of Americans in the coming months, killing between 100,000 and 240,000. Hospitals in the state of New York, where there are more than 75,000 confirmed cases, are already overwhelmed and experiencing shortages of critical medical equipment such as ventilators and protective gear. The grim projections indicate that the virus has not reached its peak and that the situation will get worse.
Amid the pandemic, U.S. President Donald Trump and other world leaders have faced criticism for their slow and ineffective response since it became clear that the coronavirus would not be contained to China, where it originated. Other countries such as Taiwan, Singapore, and South Korea have been heralded as relative success stories for flattening the curve before infection rates soared exponentially. As countries brace for a monthslong crisis, we’ve collected our top reads and interviews from recent weeks on how governments and citizens around the world have responded to the threat of COVID-19 so far.
Taiwan recorded its first case of the coronavirus on Jan. 21, but it has managed to keep its number of confirmed cases to just 329 with five deaths as of April 1. The country is effectively locked out of the World Health Organization (WHO), since membership is usually only accorded to countries that are members of the United Nations, which does not recognize Taiwan. But as Hilton Yip wrote on March 16, the government sprang into action as soon as news broke about a mysterious illness in Wuhan. Taiwan, which sits just 100 miles from mainland China, began inspecting travelers coming from the city on Dec. 31, set up a system to track those in self-quarantine, and ramped up production of medical equipment in January. (Taiwan has not yet resumed exports of the supplies, including surgical face masks.)
Yip attributed Taiwan’s early and effective response to past experience. “Given that Taiwan has faced everything from its giant neighbor—the spreading of fake news, military threats, the withholding of vital medical information during the SARS outbreak in 2003—the country knows it must be on its fullest guard whenever any major problem emerges in China,” he wrote.
South Korea, which had one of the largest initial outbreaks outside China, also managed to slow the spread of new coronavirus cases without instituting any lockdowns. Devi Sridhar argued on March 23 that the country’s exemplary model for mass diagnostic testing was the only way to contain the outbreak—and that other countries should look to East Asia for lessons. South Korea, which has a population of 51 million, tests more than 20,000 people daily at designated testing sites and uses isolation and widespread contact tracing to break chains of transmission—as recommended by WHO. “South Korea is showing how this model ultimately pays off in reducing spread, taking pressure off health services, and keeping its death rate one of the lowest in the world,” Sridhar wrote.
In the West, Canada managed to roll out more expansive testing than the neighboring United States, as Justin Ling wrote on March 13. In January and February, Canada began setting up the infrastructure to conduct tests and contact tracing. The early response in part came from the country’s experience during the SARS outbreak in 2003. (Then, Canada was the only country outside Asia to report deaths from the virus.) Canada has a well-funded public health care system, and its criteria for who can be tested for COVID-19 is not as limited as in the United States. “Canada has spent the past two decades preparing for this moment,” Ling wrote. “By catching cases early, and investigating their origins, Canada has blunted the impact of the virus thus far.”
Some success stories are unexpected. On the Don’t Touch Your Face podcast, Foreign Policy’s Amy Mackinnon singled out the early response of the country of Georgia. Despite its small size and struggling economy, the country began taking serious measures at the end of February, including closing schools and conducting widespread diagnostic tests. Georgia has so far confirmed 117 cases and no deaths from COVID-19. “I think the fact that the government took it seriously from the very start has helped,” the Georgian journalist Natalia Antelava told Mackinnon. So has Georgia’s mindset. “This is a country that is used to crisis, and it is a country that has lived through civil wars and the Russian invasion in 2008 and a very dark period through the ’90s after the collapse of the Soviet Union,” Antelava said.
Mackinnon also interviewed Jelena Ciric, a journalist in Iceland, which has one of the highest per capita rates of confirmed coronavirus cases. That’s because it has also tested more people per capita than anywhere else in the world—an effort led by a private medical research company based in Reykjavik. The research will be used to inform the global response to the pandemic. “What that gives us in Iceland is somewhat of a clearer picture of how the virus is spreading through the general population,” Ciric said. “Our growth has not actually become exponential due to these early measures of quarantining people who have likely been exposed to the virus.”
Throughout Europe, many countries are under lockdown—but not Sweden, which has remained stoic amid its high-risk outbreak. The country has reported 4,947 cases, but its government is betting that its distinctive high trust culture means that individuals will act responsibly without being ordered to do so, wrote Nathalie Rothschild on March 24, reporting from Stockholm. “[T]here is an expectation that citizens will conform, that they will take personal responsibility and avoid crowds, work from home, keep a distance on public transport, and so on, without being strong-armed into doing so,” she wrote. The next two weeks could reveal whether that is a precarious calculation.
Elsewhere, citizens are not so trusting of their governments’ expertise. In Russia, daily life continued as normal until mid-March, when medical experts began questioning official statistics showing a low rate of COVID-19 infection. The government moved quickly to close the borders and announce a large economic stimulus plan, wrote Foreign Policy’s Reid Standish, reporting from Moscow. “Should the true scope of the virus prove to be higher than shown in official statistics, it would mean that the Russian government has missed its chance to slow the pandemic,” he wrote. Two weeks later, it appears that the coronavirus could present a serious political challenge for President Vladimir Putin, as Standish reported on March 30.
There is also significant doubt about the statistics in Iran, which officially reports 47,593 coronavirus cases and 3,036 deaths as of April 1. The real figures are almost certainly much higher—making Iran a coronavirus epicenter, Maysam Behravesh argues. As cases climbed in China in January, Iranian officials didn’t restrict travel between the countries and apparently delayed announcing an outbreak in the religious city of Qom until after the first COVID-19 deaths. Many high-ranking figures have since died from the virus. Behravesh attributes Iran’s failed response in part to misunderstanding.
“Iran’s general neglect of the colossal public health threat posed by the coronavirus also emanates from its fundamental unfamiliarity with the nature of such a peril,” he writes. “After all, the virus isn’t a domestic revolt or foreign intervention aimed at regime change, but a creeping, invisible menace against the whole society that requires a science-centered response.”


foreignpolicy--2020-04-02--The Coronavirus Won’t Kill the Islamic Republic

Iran has been hit hard by the novel coronavirus .
As a result of its extensive ties with China and its typical bureaucratic incompetence and political malfeasance , the disease , or COVID-19 , came early to Iran and has been wreaking havoc .
As of April 2 , Iran had more than 50,000 cases and just over 3,100 deaths—the seventh-most cases in the world and the fifth-most deaths .
Moreover , Iran ’ s number of infections is undoubtedly much higher , probably three to five times more .
Several Iranian officials have attested to this , but it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s death rate of 6.3 percent of those infected—which is at least three times higher than that of most countries , suggesting that the number of cases is much higher than Iran knows or will admit .
The regime has made an absolute mess of the situation .
Many Iranian officials have even been infected , and roughly a dozen senior leaders have died .
The regime has been repeatedly caught lying about the spread and impact of the disease , as well as its own preparedness to cope with it .
COVID-19 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ corruption and ineptitude of the regime .
COVID-19 is just the latest in a series of calamities to befall the Iranian people .
U.S. sanctions have hamstrung the Iranian economy over the past year , causing nearly a 9 percent contraction of Iran ’ s GDP last year .
This prompted the regime to eliminate fuel subsidies , setting off widespread riots .
Massive floods have devastated large parts of the country , damaging agriculture and infrastructure and destroying the homes of thousands of people .
In recent weeks , Saudi Arabia and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ prices , threatening to suffocate Iran ’ s already gasping government revenues .
Meanwhile , Iran has arguably been in a pre-revolutionary state since about 1997 .
Since then , it has experienced mass public protests aimed at overthrowing the regime in 1999 , 2000 , 2003 , 2009 , 2017 , and 2019-2020 .
As a result of all this , is it reasonable to ask whether the COVID-19 crisis might finally bring down the Iranian regime ?
Unfortunately for everyone but Iran ’ s autocratic leadership , that seems unlikely .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ before the outbreak of COVID-19 , the Iranian regime had little legitimacy .
It was not a venerable dynasty whose sheer longevity made Iranians feel warm and fuzzy about it .
It is a pseudo-democracy at best , and the trappings of pluralism have worn thin since the revolution , so it can not claim a mandate from the masses .
What little legitimacy it retains stems from the fact that the Islamists led the revolution and won the struggle for power that followed .
Some residual admiration for Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the population enthusiastically supports the regime , mostly because they benefit directly from it .
However , the Islamic Republic has ultimately withstood repeated attempts at popular revolution , not from any degree of legitimacy but by dint of force .
The regime has shown itself willing to do whatever is necessary to keep itself in power , including assaulting , arresting , and killing its own citizens .
And as the history of revolutions has repeatedly demonstrated , they succeed only if the regime loses the will or the capacity to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ far , the regime never has , and there is no evidence that the COVID-19 crisis has altered either the determination or the ability .
Likewise , neither the prior calamities nor the current COVID-19 crisis appears to have increased the odds of a military coup .
Over the decades , the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps ( IRGC ) has grown in power to the point where it is almost coterminous with the regime , giving the IRGC no reason to overthrow it .
While some expatriates continue to hope that the regular @ @ @ @ @ @ @ move against the regime if given a chance , there is no evidence of that .
In fact , whenever evidence has been available , it typically shows the Artesh competing with the IRGC to demonstrate its loyalty to the regime .
None of this history suggests that COVID-19 would have a decisive impact on the regime ’ s hold on power in the near term .
Tehran ’ s appalling mishandling of the virus will doubtless further erode the regime ’ s legitimacy .
However , since legitimacy has not been the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ many years , there is little reason to believe that this will affect or effect a change of regime .
Moreover , there are at least three aspects of the current crisis that suggest that a successful revolution will be less likely in the near future : First , there has never been a successful revolution without mass demonstrations .
The spread and fear of COVID-19 have effectively eliminated the potential for large-scale marches , rallies , and other mass protests that have been the key to every previous revolution in history .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ protest movements in Iraq and Lebanon , which had been going on for months .
If there were widespread strikes in Iran , it is not clear that anyone would even notice .
What would they even look like ?
While it is possible that Iranian revolutionaries might devise the first virtual revolution to topple a regime , that seems unlikely .
Second , the hard-liners are responding in a more responsible fashion than the pragmatists .
Iran never ceases to amaze .
So far , it has been the hard-liners , led @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the most efficacious and appropriate fashion .
They have been the ones arguing for travel bans , quarantines , curfews , social distancing , canceling of religious and cultural events , and government assistance to those physically and economically distressed .
Bizarrely , it has been the moderates and pragmatists , led by President Hassan Rouhani , who have insisted that the virus is not very dangerous , that Iran ’ s medical problems are exaggerated , and that people should go about their daily lives .
For instance , in mid-March @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and health experts that Iran ’ s cities needed to be under quarantine , Rouhani refused to do so .
He and his allies reportedly favored preserving Iran ’ s economy at the expense of allowing the virus to spread .
Meanwhile , Iran ’ s Interior Ministry , led by the notorious hard-liner Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli , made the unpopular decision to close all of Iran ’ s religious shrines , despite unhappiness from the clergy and the most conservative segments of the public .
Consequently , when the history of this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ see the hard-liners as the heroes and the pragmatists as the villains of the story .
That , too , would make them less inclined to move decisively against the system .
Finally , the regime leadership tends to close ranks in the face of any crisis .
So far , the political aspect of the COVID-19 crisis in Iran has been about assigning blame , and that has largely fallen on the pragmatists .
However , if the crisis were to morph into a threat to the regime by popular forces , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those fissures would disappear .
The regime ’ s leadership tends to quickly cohere around the hardest-line position of crushing dissent no matter what the cost .
This is what happened in 1999 , when Mohammad Khatami ’ s reform movement began to turn into a wider revolutionary threat .
It is also what happened in 2009 in response to the Green Revolution—and , indeed , in the face of every other large-scale protest movement .
Thus , it seems unlikely that the COVID-19 crisis will trigger regime change in Iran in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , however , the regime ’ s catastrophic mishandling of the virus , even despite the more appropriate reactions of its hard-liners , will probably reinforce the already widespread desire for political change among Iranians .
The incompetence and corruption of the regime is one of the most important complaints of average Iranians who have been voting against the regime ’ s preferred candidates , taking to the streets to protest on a regular basis , and chanting for the end of the regime and the overthrow of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei @ @ @ @ @ @ @ years .
While COVID-19 seems unlikely to be the trigger for the fall of the Islamic Republic , when the regime ’ s history is finally written , it may very well be that we will look back on this crisis and say that it helped hasten its end .

Iran has been hit hard by the novel coronavirus. As a result of its extensive ties with China and its typical bureaucratic incompetence and political malfeasance , the disease, or COVID-19, came early to Iran and has been wreaking havoc. As of April 2, Iran had more than 50,000 cases and just over 3,100 deaths—the seventh-most cases in the world and the fifth-most deaths. Moreover, Iran’s number of infections is undoubtedly much higher, probably three to five times more. Several Iranian officials have attested to this, but it is also suggested by the country’s death rate of 6.3 percent of those infected—which is at least three times higher than that of most countries, suggesting that the number of cases is much higher than Iran knows or will admit.
Iran has been hit hard by the novel coronavirus. As a result of its extensive ties with China and its typical bureaucratic incompetence and political malfeasance, the disease, or COVID-19, came early to Iran and has been wreaking havoc. As of April 2, Iran had more than 50,000 cases and just over 3,100 deaths—the seventh-most cases in the world and the fifth-most deaths. Moreover, Iran’s number of infections is undoubtedly much higher, probably three to five times more. Several Iranian officials have attested to this, but it is also suggested by the country’s death rate of 6.3 percent of those infected—which is at least three times higher than that of most countries, suggesting that the number of cases is much higher than Iran knows or will admit.
The regime has made an absolute mess of the situation. Many Iranian officials have even been infected, and roughly a dozen senior leaders have died. The regime has been repeatedly caught lying about the spread and impact of the disease, as well as its own preparedness to cope with it. COVID-19 has reinforced common Iranian frustrations with the corruption and ineptitude of the regime.
COVID-19 is just the latest in a series of calamities to befall the Iranian people. U.S. sanctions have hamstrung the Iranian economy over the past year, causing nearly a 9 percent contraction of Iran’s GDP last year. This prompted the regime to eliminate fuel subsidies, setting off widespread riots. Massive floods have devastated large parts of the country, damaging agriculture and infrastructure and destroying the homes of thousands of people. In recent weeks, Saudi Arabia and Russia have gone to war over oil prices, threatening to suffocate Iran’s already gasping government revenues. Meanwhile, Iran has arguably been in a pre-revolutionary state since about 1997. Since then, it has experienced mass public protests aimed at overthrowing the regime in 1999, 2000, 2003, 2009, 2017, and 2019-2020.
As a result of all this, is it reasonable to ask whether the COVID-19 crisis might finally bring down the Iranian regime? Unfortunately for everyone but Iran’s autocratic leadership, that seems unlikely.
[Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak: Get daily updates on the pandemic and learn how it’s affecting countries around the world.]
It’s true that, even before the outbreak of COVID-19, the Iranian regime had little legitimacy. It was not a venerable dynasty whose sheer longevity made Iranians feel warm and fuzzy about it. It is a pseudo-democracy at best, and the trappings of pluralism have worn thin since the revolution, so it cannot claim a mandate from the masses. What little legitimacy it retains stems from the fact that the Islamists led the revolution and won the struggle for power that followed. Some residual admiration for Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini also helps. In addition, a segment of the population enthusiastically supports the regime, mostly because they benefit directly from it.
However, the Islamic Republic has ultimately withstood repeated attempts at popular revolution, not from any degree of legitimacy but by dint of force. The regime has shown itself willing to do whatever is necessary to keep itself in power, including assaulting, arresting, and killing its own citizens. And as the history of revolutions has repeatedly demonstrated, they succeed only if the regime loses the will or the capacity to use force against the people. So far, the regime never has, and there is no evidence that the COVID-19 crisis has altered either the determination or the ability.
Likewise, neither the prior calamities nor the current COVID-19 crisis appears to have increased the odds of a military coup. Over the decades, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has grown in power to the point where it is almost coterminous with the regime, giving the IRGC no reason to overthrow it. While some expatriates continue to hope that the regular armed forces, the Artesh, would move against the regime if given a chance, there is no evidence of that. In fact, whenever evidence has been available, it typically shows the Artesh competing with the IRGC to demonstrate its loyalty to the regime.
None of this history suggests that COVID-19 would have a decisive impact on the regime’s hold on power in the near term. Tehran’s appalling mishandling of the virus will doubtless further erode the regime’s legitimacy. However, since legitimacy has not been the strong suit of the Islamic Republic for many years, there is little reason to believe that this will affect or effect a change of regime.
Moreover, there are at least three aspects of the current crisis that suggest that a successful revolution will be less likely in the near future:
First, there has never been a successful revolution without mass demonstrations. The spread and fear of COVID-19 have effectively eliminated the potential for large-scale marches, rallies, and other mass protests that have been the key to every previous revolution in history. Indeed, the disease has ended the protest movements in Iraq and Lebanon, which had been going on for months. If there were widespread strikes in Iran, it is not clear that anyone would even notice. What would they even look like? While it is possible that Iranian revolutionaries might devise the first virtual revolution to topple a regime, that seems unlikely.
Second, the hard-liners are responding in a more responsible fashion than the pragmatists. Iran never ceases to amaze. So far, it has been the hard-liners, led by the IRGC, who have responded in the most efficacious and appropriate fashion. They have been the ones arguing for travel bans, quarantines, curfews, social distancing, canceling of religious and cultural events, and government assistance to those physically and economically distressed. Bizarrely, it has been the moderates and pragmatists, led by President Hassan Rouhani, who have insisted that the virus is not very dangerous, that Iran’s medical problems are exaggerated, and that people should go about their daily lives. For instance, in mid-March, despite a consensus among Iranian doctors and health experts that Iran’s cities needed to be under quarantine, Rouhani refused to do so. He and his allies reportedly favored preserving Iran’s economy at the expense of allowing the virus to spread. Meanwhile, Iran’s Interior Ministry, led by the notorious hard-liner Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli, made the unpopular decision to close all of Iran’s religious shrines, despite unhappiness from the clergy and the most conservative segments of the public. Consequently, when the history of this crisis is finally written, Iranians may see the hard-liners as the heroes and the pragmatists as the villains of the story. That, too, would make them less inclined to move decisively against the system.
Finally, the regime leadership tends to close ranks in the face of any crisis. So far, the political aspect of the COVID-19 crisis in Iran has been about assigning blame, and that has largely fallen on the pragmatists. However, if the crisis were to morph into a threat to the regime by popular forces, the history of the Islamic Republic suggests those fissures would disappear. The regime’s leadership tends to quickly cohere around the hardest-line position of crushing dissent no matter what the cost. This is what happened in 1999, when Mohammad Khatami’s reform movement began to turn into a wider revolutionary threat. It is also what happened in 2009 in response to the Green Revolution—and, indeed, in the face of every other large-scale protest movement.
Thus, it seems unlikely that the COVID-19 crisis will trigger regime change in Iran in the near term. Over the longer term, however, the regime’s catastrophic mishandling of the virus, even despite the more appropriate reactions of its hard-liners, will probably reinforce the already widespread desire for political change among Iranians.
The incompetence and corruption of the regime is one of the most important complaints of average Iranians who have been voting against the regime’s preferred candidates, taking to the streets to protest on a regular basis, and chanting for the end of the regime and the overthrow of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in increasing numbers for more than 20 years. While COVID-19 seems unlikely to be the trigger for the fall of the Islamic Republic, when the regime’s history is finally written, it may very well be that we will look back on this crisis and say that it helped hasten its end.