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Comment by throwaway84774 | Hacker News Reader

Something that has been striking about COVID-19 is that it seems to have been consistently underestimated by experts, especially in western nations. With the exception of Singapore (which put an Australian in charge of its response), Asian countries that were hit hard by SARS or MERS responded swiftly and decisively: Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea and China crushed the virus. Other countries seemed to dither, and react slowly. Australia, which was the exception, seems poised to squander its gains.

Is it because of limited mortality in the young (which doesn't seem to translate to limited morbidity)? Is it the fact that "coronavirus" meant "common cold" to medical experts? Arrogance? Complacency?

To a non-expert, a rapidly spreading novel virus with unknown long-term effects would be something to be eradicated, but the emphasis from western governments in particular seems to be reactive and ambivalent and hinging on the hope of a vaccine.

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I live in Taiwan.

Simple answer is that it’s a cultural difference which has a positive impact on health. Wearing a mask was normal behaviour before covid so it’s a non issue to wear one during the peak. There is no one screaming about their independence being taken away by being “forced” to wear a mask. All the homeschooler supermom Karens and anti vax types protesting about their right to choose a mask or whatever looks really really bad over here and Taiwanese people generally think westerners are retarded in regards to covid.

Also, asians are healthier, slimmer with Well rounded diets (on average.) Tons of smokers here though. A lot of Taiwanese people are happy homebodies too.

Many westerners think anti-mask westerners are retarded as well, lol. I can't even imagine how insane we must look to other cultures right now.

> With the exception of Singapore (which put an Australian in charge of its response), Asian countries that were hit hard by SARS or MERS responded swiftly and decisively: Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea and China crushed the virus.

This doesn't really mesh with the situation on the ground.

Singapore has done about as well as they reasonably could given the dorm outbreak. Ex-dorm community cases are still quite low, and we're mostly business as usual. No idea who this Aussie you're talking about is, either.

South Korea is constantly battling new flareups, and Hong Kong has effectively gone back into lockdown as of today with an exploding caseload.

The only one of those countries that can really be said to have "crushed it" is Taiwan, which is probably due in part to being a self-sufficient island and in part to the extreme level of skepticism with which they treat anything from the mainland government.

This doesn't really mesh with the situation on the ground.

I think it does: https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?scale=linear&trendline=fals...

That graph would look much less dramatic if you could plot cases in foreign worker dorms (which have been isolated and are subject to an intense testing and clearance regime[1]) separately from cases in the broader community.

As of yesterday's report[2], dorm cases account for 45,260 of the 48,035 total cases. Incidence in the ex-dorm population is only 0.04%, and fewer than half of those have unknown chains of transmission.

1. Which is, admittedly, a separate issue in and of itself.

2. https://covidsitrep.moh.gov.sg

> With the exception of Singapore (which put an Australian in charge of its response)

Both Lawrence Wong and Gan Kim Yong are Singaporeans.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Singapore

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Fisher

As in some ways the public face of the response in Singapore, Fisher has featured in a comic series “The COVID Chronicles"

Not that I have a monopoly on information or anything, but I live in Singapore and this comment is possibly the first time I have ever heard this guy's name.

chair of the National Infection Prevention and Control Committee through the Ministry of Health, Singapore (2013 -),)

To the rest of the world, he is the face of Singapore's Covid response. Based on what I've read he was influential (behind the scenes perhaps?) in Singapore's response...and the reason why your government didn't require masks till after your flare up.

His advice seems to have been taken very seriously in other countries (not requiring masks, not closing schools).

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