Probably not. If all countries had in the beginning the same amount of travelers coming from the origin point THEN you could directly attribute case/death count

Probably not. If all countries had in the beginning the same amount of travelers coming from the origin point THEN you could directly attribute case/death counts to safety measures. Some countries dodged the wave and take credit for their mandates, others didnt lock down and also dodged the wave(thus erroneously giving people confidence that doing nothing works). Even within large countries there are regional differences. For example the earlier cases of covid were appearing on the west coast, but New York got hit the hardest before either side took any particular action. Could it be because it was a busier travel nexus? We shouldn't berate ourselves for not performing the same way island nations in the southern pacific ocean did.