One can certainly defend South Korea and other non-Western countries. And certainly one can defend European countries compared to USA/England or to each other. Definitely one can say that some of them, once Italy happened, did a non-insane job of “shut things down across the board until things get better than try opening them up again” if you think that you have no other policy tools to work with.
I don’t think one can defend their performance against the standards of ’did what was likely to actually do the least harm based on physical considerations, and didn’t lie about the situation to their public.”
I do think that understanding the distinction is vital to understanding our pandemic, including our potential future responses, and therefore what one should do personally. To me this isn’t vague FUD, it’s predicting that such failures will continue.
One can certainly defend South Korea and other non-Western countries. And certainly one can defend European countries compared to USA/England or to each other. Definitely one can say that some of them, once Italy happened, did a non-insane job of “shut things down across the board until things get better than try opening them up again” if you think that you have no other policy tools to work with.
I don’t think one can defend their performance against the standards of ’did what was likely to actually do the least harm based on physical considerations, and didn’t lie about the situation to their public.”
I do think that understanding the distinction is vital to understanding our pandemic, including our potential future responses, and therefore what one should do personally. To me this isn’t vague FUD, it’s predicting that such failures will continue.