Posted by randomesquedeadhawk
Hey Steed. Able to shed light on what s Korea is doing right? And any pointers on this to do and ways to conduct ourselves that are actually useful? A lot of the articles thrown around, are just media news. And not helpful in any way.
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It doesn't hurt that we've had a lot of experience with disease outbreaks in the recent past. The 2015 MERS outbreak was totally mishandled by the government (lack of transparency, containment carelessness at medical facilities), and I think we came out of that one with lots of ideas of how it could be done better. We also had a major swine flu outbreak last year that was really, really difficult to fight (and might still be ongoing).
Overall, Korea's government has acted competently, and the people have a high level of trust in the current administration, neither of which has been the case in the US but also several other countries. I think also the people here are used to major national existential crises (colonisation, war, poverty, famine, dictatorship, and financial emergencies) and are prepared to sacrifice and change their lifestyles, while especially in the US there are delusions of invincibility. Not to single out Americans though -- Canadians certainly can't imagine major changes to their way of life, so they're unprepared.
Not just testing but also the medical system is very well-run. I was in the hospital in January and February when the disease was spreading, and they set up quarantine protocols I think in late January. If you need to get tested, you know where to go or who to call, rather than just showing up at a hospital and contaminating everyone there.
It helps that everyone in the country is familiar with face mask etiquette, but I'm still not totally sure if wearing masks has a correlative or causative relationship with the spread. In the early months I suspected people who were taking every precaution would wear masks, and you would wear a mask to signal you were extra cautious, rather than being totally protected by the mask itself. I started wearing one so I wouldn't be singled out, and now I'm afraid not to have one.
I also think not wearing your shoes inside helps. I don't understand how Americans do it, but if they wear their shoes inside and then take them off and walk on the same floor in socks or bare feet, that seems pretty unsanitary.