It's not really cool to make nationalistic attacks like this here. FWIW I'm from Australia (Melbourne), which mostly eradicated the virus last May, then had a

It's not really cool to make nationalistic attacks like this here. FWIW I'm from Australia (Melbourne), which mostly eradicated the virus last May, then had a resurgence in Jun-Aug, and it took hard lockdown from early August to November to get the outbreak fully under control - effectively four months of pretty strict lockdown. We managed to beat it but it was hugely costly. Australia, like NZ, is an island with a relatively (compared to US and Europe) small, compliant population, so it's much easier for our governments to control our international borders and internal movement. But it was still incredibly hard, and slow. We did it, which I'm pleased about, but I understand why what Australia and NZ have done is not possible in the US and Europe; they have much denser populations and many different jurisdictions and cultures all meshed together, so it's much harder to restrict movement and apply restrictions consistently enough from one place to another. So, sure, take comfort that we live in places that were able to avoid major outbreaks, but resist preaching that any other country/continent could have done it just as easily, as it really isn't that simple.