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The South
Koreans are having significant success in fighting and limiting the
CoronaVirus.
It appears
they were quick to identify the risk and had tools, assets and processes
in-place that was quickly deployed.
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Some conjecture about the reasons
for their current success:
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They are a
single entity with 50-million people and a very centralized government with
only one land boundary that is sealed shut.
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The US has
50-entities with 330-million people spread over a very large land area and long (open)
land boundaries on both the north and south and with a decentralized
government.
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From a
public health and safety readiness view, all of South Korea has been for 65-years
within artillery and rocket range for Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC)
weapons from a very hostile neighbor who frequently threatens to attack.
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Part of the
after action analysis of this virus pandemic may demonstrate that being ‘under
the gun’ and readiness for imminent NBC attack may have played a significant
roll in South Korea’s virus success.
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Coronavirus:
South Korea’s
success in controlling disease is due to its acceptance of surveillance
South Korea has been widely
praised for its management of the outbreak and spread of the coronavirus
disease COVID-19. The focus has largely been on South Korea’s enormous
virus testing programme.
What hasn’t
been so widely reported is the country’s heavy use of surveillance technology,
notably CCTV and the tracking of bank card and mobile phone usage, to identify
who to test in the first place.
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Coronavirus
cases have dropped sharply in South
Korea. What’s the secret to its success?
Europe is now the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic. Case counts
and deaths are soaring in Italy,
Spain, France, and Germany, and many countries have
imposed lockdowns and closed borders. Meanwhile, the United
States, hampered by a fiasco with delayed and faulty test
kits, is just guessing at its COVID-19 burden, though experts believe it is on
the same trajectory as countries in Europe.
Amid these
dire trends, South Korea
has emerged as a sign of hope and a model to emulate. The country of 50 million
appears to have greatly slowed its epidemic
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COVID-19
hit South Korea and the U.S. on the
same day. Here's what Korea
did right.
The U.S. and South Korea both confirmed their
first cases of new coronavirus on Jan. 21. South
Korea's epidemic seems to have already peaked, while the U.S. is girding
for public health, financial, and social crises. The key to South Korea's
relative success is testing, and South Korea's aggressive testing regime —
"South Korea as of Tuesday was testing up to 20,000 patients a day, more
than half the total of U.S. patients who have been tested since the outbreak
began," The Wall Street Journal notes — was not an accident.
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