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> Because Asian countries were basing their advice on science and the US was basing the advice on what would poll well with Republican voters who believe indivi

> Because Asian countries were basing their advice on science and the US was basing the advice on what would poll well with Republican voters who believe individual freedom is more important than community welfare. It was the WHO who repeatedly stated that healthy people shouldn't wear masks, or close borders for that matter, and most politicians across the world didn't question that. And why would they, it's the job of the WHO to understand the science for us. (If anything, Trump was initially harder on COVID than most by pushing for travel restrictions. At that time it was the Democratic NYC establishment that put individual freedom over safety [1], the two positions only flipped later on.) The initial response, especially by the WHO, was an absolutely disaster. Asian countries did better than the US and the West in general because they _didn't_ listen to the 'experts'. [1] https://twitter.com/billdeblasio/status/1234648718714036229 https://twitter.com/billdeblasio/status/1234648718714036229

makomk 6y ago
Of note, all the stuff about border closures making things worse was 100% politically motivated bullshit with no foundation in science - even the New York Times ended up admitting it: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/30/world/europe/ski-party-pandemic-travel-coronavirus.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/30/world/europe/ski-party-pa... (What they don't admit to, but was really obvious at the time, is that in the US it was driven in part by anti-Trump politics - the press quite openly associated it with all his other border policies they hated, there was a piece of pre-pandemic fiction about Trump frantically closing all the borders to stop a disease that was already in the US that circulated all over social media as a supposedly prophetic warning, and I think Biden's campaign even pushed the idea that Trump's travel restrictions made things worse after that NYT piece came out. Of course, in reality it was actually the whole of Europe who ended up frantically closing all their borders far too late, whilst the US stuck to targeted and relatively timely travel restrictions - if I recall correctly, pretty much the exact opposite of the "prophetic" anti-Trump fiction.)

makomk 6y ago

Of note, all the stuff about border closures making things worse was 100% politically motivated bullshit with no foundation in science - even the New York Times ended up admitting it: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/30/world/europe/ski-party-pandemic-travel-coronavirus.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/30/world/europe/ski-party-pa... (What they don't admit to, but was really obvious at the time, is that in the US it was driven in part by anti-Trump politics - the press quite openly associated it with all his other border policies they hated, there was a piece of pre-pandemic fiction about Trump frantically closing all the borders to stop a disease that was already in the US that circulated all over social media as a supposedly prophetic warning, and I think Biden's campaign even pushed the idea that Trump's travel restrictions made things worse after that NYT piece came out. Of course, in reality it was actually the whole of Europe who ended up frantically closing all their borders far too late, whilst the US stuck to targeted and relatively timely travel restrictions - if I recall correctly, pretty much the exact opposite of the "prophetic" anti-Trump fiction.)