What Prepares a Country for a Pandemic? An Epidemic Helps
The governments that seem to have been most ready for Covid-19 have something in common: a recent coronavirus scare.
South Korea has been down this road before.
Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/BloombergLots of people have been offering opinions lately on what the spread of the coronavirus reveals about the strengths and weaknesses of different forms of government, health-care systems and even cultures.
The disastrous mishandling of the initial outbreak in Wuhan, China, which paved the way for a global pandemic, was plausibly painted as evidence of the inadequacy of authoritarian regimes. The Chinese government’s subsequent success in getting the epidemic under control, though, could be seen as evidence of the opposite — at least, that’s what the Chinese government would like you to think.