COVID-19 Discussion:
BY ARUSH BHARDWAJ
In terms of addressing the COVID-19 crisis, President Donald Trump of the United States has certainly displayed quite a peculiar approach. His methods of negating the true severity of the pandemic, and reassuring the populous by simply presenting lies, has proven to be quite ineffective as individual state governors have begun taking matters into their own hands. As such, why do you think other world leaders have pursued different avenues of controlling the spread of the virus? How has this varying approach impacted their own respective nations?
Despite the rest of the world having far less money than the U.S.A to spend on COVID-19 relief, whether it be through government funded programs, research and development for vaccinations and medication, or simply just stimulus packages, many countries have handled the pandemic far better than the U.S.A has. New Zealand for example took an extremely quick and stricter response to COVID-19 in comparison to the U.S.A. Lockdown procedures for New Zealand actually began before COVID-19 was even declared a pandemic, and their much stricter reguations on international transport helped ensure that the spread of the virus was less prevalent. This turned out very successful for them, and they have been COVID-free for weeks now, while infection rates in the U.S.A are continuing to accelerate.
Indeed, Soham. I agree with your sentiments regarding the swift and effective COVID-19 responses of nations such as New Zealand. These nations succeeded in extinguishing the raging inferno that the novel coronavirus pandemic has become in other nations such as the United States. Not only have the infection rates decreased in New Zealand, but European nations have also been seeing a steady decline in COVID cases. In essence, such promising statistics can be attributed to their solidarity as nations united in the face of this crisis, to citizens getting reliable guidance from their governments and leaders, something that the President of the United States simply has not been able to accomplish.
Building off Soham and Arush, in my opinion, it is quite incredible to see how varying approaches to the current global crisis are resulting in many different effects, even if these approaches are similar to a certain extent. Seeing the ability of New Zealand to be able to minimize their number of cases to be free of the COVID-19 virus is especially extraordinary as it suggests the effectiveness and impact that proactive measures and early action can have on combatting a public health emergency that can be significantly detrimental to the entire world.
When considering the approach of the United States on combatting the COVID-19 pandemic, it is evident that proactive measures could have been instituted before the current predicament accelerated to the state at which it is today. In fact, states that were once in complete lockdown and soon recovered from the excessive number of cases per day were forced to enter lockdown again after opening up. However, efforts are being made to improve the current situation. For instance, the United States of America, Canada, and Mexico have agreed on collaborating in terms of resources and knowledge to combat the incrementing number of cases from the coronavirus. As such, these pursuits adopted by world leaders in the North American continent may expound a reduced number of cases in the future. Undoubtedly, however, it is crucial for everyone to practice measures of social distancing and prevention to ensure that they avoid contracting this pandemic in an effort to protect themself and the people around them.
It is clear that the major resurgence of Covid-19 cases in various states of the United States can at least be partially attributed to public ignorance of the dangers of the virus. This is mostly due to how President Trump commonly downplays the severity of the virus and has refused to wear a mask when attending public events. Even worse, it seems that wearing a mask has become a political issue, as it was determined that Democrats are more likely to wear masks than Republicans, and Democratic officials are usually much more vocal in their support of mask-wearing. This made mask-wearing almost a political statement, instead of a basic necessity for infection control. Moreover, since many states have gradually lifted some social distancing restrictions and have reopened many businesses, increased public gatherings (without the use of social distancing) have also contributed to this resurgence. This explains why many of the new cases are younger people when many have asserted that young people have nothing to worry about with the virus. Thus, it is clear that the United States has to rewind to the beginning of the reopening spree and institute a slower and more cautious process, like those of other countries that have already mitigated the virus.
Well as you guys say new Zealand and Australia have combat the situation very well compared to the rest of the world. Though the government action is very important in such cases there is one more thing which has helped them that was the citizens and also a small population for a very large area.
For countries like USA n India more than a pandemic it has become a political issue. Hence dividing the population.reacting and supporting the decisions was like another social media war. Another disadvantage for country like India n Pakistan , Philippines or Bangladesh Or many other Asian countries is economic Weakness and difficulty for social distancing due to lack of sufficient n hygienic place of Living.
Even countries like Hongkong or Singapore were almost able to control the pandemic as citizens too took a drastic approach on wearing mask ,social distancing And maintaining good level of hygiene, but compact living standards especially for low income group was a big challenge.
Aart from this there are suppressed news channels in china Singapore or North Korea which makes it difficult to find exact internal impacts of pandemic .