Cathal MacSwiney Brugha：China's Large-Scale Governance Response Against COVID-19 is Succeeding

The world is at the start of a new era, broadly associated with Climate Change, where climate / weather / health-related events on a global level are challenging mankind, increasingly and internationally, and testing governance capacities and capabilities throughout the world.

Refugees leaving their homelands, fires in Australia, melting ice-caps, flooding, storms, and now we have viral epidemics.

Increasing fear is leading to negative political responses: threats of war, break-down of trade and international agreements, excessive dictatorial regimes, all of which are making a bad situation worse, just when the world should be acting more maturely, cooperating better, mutually helping one another to deal with current challenges, and prepare for newer ones, even before they arise.

The Coved-19 CoronaVirus is similar to flu, in that it has a low mortality rate, compared to the high mortality rate of SARS.  But it is different in that it is new, and consequently there are not yet inoculations against the virus, or known successful treatments. The greatest threat it brings is because of its two-week incubation time compared to about two days for flu.  Consequently, it is easily spread by unknowing carriers of the virus, and could become a pandemic, i.e. spread globally.

China has a dense population, and so is vulnerable to the rapid spread of COVID-19.  On the other hand, China has the strength of governance to take on a massive task of using isolation to prevent the spread of the disease, and also to increase the facilities need for treating it.

Already the numbers of new cases have peaked in China, showing that its large-scale governance response is succeeding.

The worry is that COIVD-19 may spread to under-developed countries where there is wide-spread poverty and a lack of effective health-care population-wide.

It is unfortunate that some regimes, particularly the United States, are using this challenge as an opportunity to spread racist fear and discontent world-wide.  They are not doing a good service to humanity.

Cathal MacSwiney Brugha
Emeritus & Adjunct Prof. Decision Analytics, Coll. of Business, U. College Dublin
President, Analytics Society of Ireland