same goes for taiwan. its not news that relatively small islands with restrictive and defensive covid policies got this right.
But China is also kicking ass. Everyone in a city gets tested if there are even a few cases. Thailand also seems to be doing ok. Italy also has it under control for now.
There are clearly strategies that would work for non-islands.
NZ doesn’t rely on cross border lorry drivers either, and is far enough away that any boats are quarantined
You can't land just anywhere on an island, but you can take lots of roads into large countries on a continent. Islands have much more control over arrivals than landlocked countries with lots of neighbors and very integrated road & train networks.
So islands will ship everything already, whereas most land-countries move a lot of goods with trucking, and spread the disease that way, even when land-borders are closed.
International travel can be closed off with little repercussion.
Contrast NZ with the UK. That train wreck has hit an island that should have done better.