4 ms·

The first and most important step in the New Zealand strategy is “be an island”. You need a lot of draconianism to make up for land borders.

dnautics 5y ago
This tracks. Hawaii still has the lowest COVID in all of the US, and even the city (note: not the county) of alameda has the lowest COVID rate in all cities in the bay area (it's kind of a pain in the ass to get to). Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, are all islands. And South Korea is... politically an island.
petesergeant 5y ago
Thailand did well with a zero Covid policy until Delta, and has plenty of land border
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  “Being an island helps” doesn’t mean “the only thing that helps is being an island”.
BLKNSLVR 5y ago
Definitely true, and that's also one of the reasons Australia has had it so mildly on the global scale. South Australia has had, I think, only four deaths, and this unbelievably low number is, I think, one of the benefits of being on the island of Australia, and not being particularly recognised as a tourist destination in the way Sydney and Melbourne and various part of Queensland are. ie. South Australia has the ocean borders of Australia and the psychological borders of unpopularity. The combination of which has proven incredibly effective.
lifeformed 5y ago
Everyone says this because it makes sense at first glance, but does it really? Did the US get most of its infections from people driving over from Canada and Mexico? A virus from China or South Africa spreads by planes, not cars.
- coryrc 5y ago
  How about the border between Washington State (65% fully vaccinated) and Idaho (45% fully vaccinated). Lots of covidiots using eastern Washington hospital ICU capacity.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  Fair enough, I should have said “be a small island”. Obviously everything changes when you’re dealing with a population two orders of magnitude that of New Zealand: it’s harder to secure ports, harder to control contagion internally, etc. Moreover, the US never even attempted to harden its ports until the virus was already spreading out of control. That said, the US has a lot of people crossing its land borders—even if it completely hardened its ports, outlawed border crossings, and was much better at reducing internal contagion, it would still have to deal with thousands of people who cross illegally and who aren’t going to quarantine for two weeks or abide by any kind of contact tracing programs.

dnautics 5y ago

This tracks. Hawaii still has the lowest COVID in all of the US, and even the city (note: not the county) of alameda has the lowest COVID rate in all cities in the bay area (it's kind of a pain in the ass to get to). Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, are all islands. And South Korea is... politically an island.

petesergeant 5y ago

Thailand did well with a zero Covid policy until Delta, and has plenty of land border

throwaway894345 5y ago
“Being an island helps” doesn’t mean “the only thing that helps is being an island”.

BLKNSLVR 5y ago

Definitely true, and that's also one of the reasons Australia has had it so mildly on the global scale. South Australia has had, I think, only four deaths, and this unbelievably low number is, I think, one of the benefits of being on the island of Australia, and not being particularly recognised as a tourist destination in the way Sydney and Melbourne and various part of Queensland are. ie. South Australia has the ocean borders of Australia and the psychological borders of unpopularity. The combination of which has proven incredibly effective.

lifeformed 5y ago

Everyone says this because it makes sense at first glance, but does it really? Did the US get most of its infections from people driving over from Canada and Mexico? A virus from China or South Africa spreads by planes, not cars.

coryrc 5y ago
How about the border between Washington State (65% fully vaccinated) and Idaho (45% fully vaccinated). Lots of covidiots using eastern Washington hospital ICU capacity.
throwaway894345 5y ago
Fair enough, I should have said “be a small island”. Obviously everything changes when you’re dealing with a population two orders of magnitude that of New Zealand: it’s harder to secure ports, harder to control contagion internally, etc. Moreover, the US never even attempted to harden its ports until the virus was already spreading out of control. That said, the US has a lot of people crossing its land borders—even if it completely hardened its ports, outlawed border crossings, and was much better at reducing internal contagion, it would still have to deal with thousands of people who cross illegally and who aren’t going to quarantine for two weeks or abide by any kind of contact tracing programs.