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Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Vietnam, Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan.
These countries, located in the Asia-Pacific region, have been praised for their response to the coronavirus pandemic.
All of these countries have been successful in controlling outbreaks of the epidemic for much of 2020 with strict general quarantines and models of infection testing and surveillance, which were then replicated by other countries.
But now, the second year of the pandemic has brought other challenges. New, more potent variants have emerged that have generated new epidemics that are difficult to control in some of these countries.
Meanwhile, other parts of the world seem to be getting ahead with large-scale vaccination campaigns, which are gradually emerging from the crisis.
This means that these model countries cannot remain isolated to maintain their zero diffusion strategy and remain forever “hidden” from the rest of the world.
Let’s first see how these countries managed to bring the Covid-19 pandemic under control in its infancy.
The map below shows that infection and death rates were lower than in other countries.
Closing the borders was one of the first and most effective measures taken by these eight countries when the pandemic began to progress.
The fact that most of these countries are islands certainly contributed to border control.
The strict border blockade meant not only the closure of the entry of foreigners, but also the obligation for those who arrived to spend long periods in quarantine in specially affected hotels.
In this sense, Australia was the strictest country. In fact, during the second wave of infection in India, it even banned its own citizens for fear that they would carry the virus.
And when the infections reached the communities, they had a meticulous tracking system installed to prevent the spread of the virus.
Singapore, which already had a highly proven surveillance system, was one of the best examples of how the chains of transmission of the virus that cause COVID-19 could be cut.
In addition, Australia has put its major cities in flash quarantine even when a single case has been recorded. This has happened eight times, in six different cities.
Many of these decisions may have been called extreme, but they worked by creating a protective bubble. After the first wave, many of those sites that had been put under strict quarantine were able to return to normal life.
New Zealand was the first country to declare itself free from COVID-19, after it was also one of the first to establish a quarantine.
By June 2020, he had lifted almost all social distancing measures.
Meanwhile, other countries in this small group found that infections had declined, allowing them to relax many of the lockdowns they had put in place.
However, the new variants that have emerged, combined with the relaxation of containment and social distancing measures, have meant that since May there has been a resurgence, albeit less, of the virus in these places.
The most notable increases in cases have been recorded in Taiwan and Vietnam, where they are bearing the brunt of a new wave of infections.
Tokyo residents have taken to the streets to demand the cancellation of the Olympics.
In Taiwan, a slight relaxation of the screening rules that apply to commercial aviation pilots has caused a fairly rapid spread across the country, while in Vietnam a new variant has caused serious epidemics, largely motivated by rallies. community.
Japan is also experiencing an increase in the number of cases, which has raised alarms, especially since the delayed 2020 Olympic Games are expected to take place there, now scheduled for the end of July.
However, it should be noted that the numbers since reaching the summit have been halved.
In South Korea – which has never experienced severe containment – experts believe that infection surveillance and the community effort have succeeded, once again, in reducing the last contagion curve they have known.
Now, small outbreaks have also occurred in Singapore, Hong Kong and Australia, prompting strong and swift action by authorities, modeled on a two-week blitzkrieg in Melbourne and a four-week partial shutdown in Singapore. .
While these recent epidemics have been controlled with some success and with reliable methods, the truth is that they have brought out a bitter truth.
And, although they have been successful in keeping the virus at bay, these countries have not had as much success in securing vaccines.
While it is true that the initial acquisition was difficult all over the world, it was the countries most affected by the pandemic that were quickly successful in launching a vaccination program, especially if they could finance it.
Countries with low infection rates reacted more slowly when it came to getting doses for their citizens.
So far, the United States and Europe have successfully immunized about half of their populations, and many countries in Latin America have administered millions of doses.
All of these countries are working to achieve a level of immunization that allows them to return to a certain normality, even if the virus continues to haunt them.
Like many in the region, Japan has long held the virus at bay.
This is not the case in the prosperous countries of Asia-Pacific.
The percentages of the vaccinated population are less than a quarter of the population. And this figure concerns rich countries like Australia, Japan, New Zealand and Taiwan, where the difficulty of acquiring vaccines is expected to be similar to that faced by Europe and the United States.
There are also doubts among citizens, as registered in Hong Kong and Taiwan, that they do not trust the health authorities or the safety provided by the vaccine, which has limited the conduct of the campaigns.
The only exception to the rule was Singapore, where 42% of the population received at least one dose.
Singapore is however a city-state of only five million inhabitants, which suggests that the number of doses applied is low in absolute terms, if we compare for example India which applied 250 million doses.
As Covid-19 is likely to become an endemic disease, the only way out for countries is vaccination.
But until collective immunity is achieved, it appears Asian pandemic stars are reluctant to relax the strict measures that have worked so well for them: border closures, restrictions and social distancing rules.
When Australia said its borders would remain closed until mid-2022, it sparked a public debate over how long the country could remain a “hermit kingdom.”
The idea of a travel bubble has floated among some Asian countries.
If there are no plans to slam the doors, it is a question of cautiously seeking a gradual exit. Possible travel bubbles that could occur between different “safe” countries are also debated.
Hong Kong and Singapore had discussed a plan in this regard, before it was thwarted by further outbreaks.
And this channel is already operating between Australia and New Zealand, which do not record local cases most of the time. However, both countries immediately block this binational connection channel whenever a new set of cases arise.
Experts have warned that for nations to be truly open, their societies must eliminate the “zero covid” mentality, which is unrealistic with the virus in high circulation, and try to “live” with the virus.
People have called for a clearer exit strategy, with multi-level goals aligned with rapid vaccination programs, but those solutions are still a long way off.
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