The seven countries with better coronavirus responses than Australia

While the coronavirus pandemic shows no sign of abating across the globe, Australia continues to manage the crisis well.  Despite we are often said to be one of the exemplars of the global public health response (even if we do say so ourselves).

What lessons can we learn from the seven countries that trumped us?

New Zealand

Special weapon: An elimination strategy

Like many of the countries who nailed their pandemic response, New Zealand is an island. But the key factor in the country’s success was how hard and fast it moved to lock down the population following early cases.

Vietnam

Special weapon: A low-tech, hard and fast response

Vietnam went more than half a year without a single death from COVID-19. The country’s approach has shown a low-tech response can be just as effective at containing the virus.

Vietnam forced hundreds of thousands of people into quarantine, even barricading off streets where infected people lived. Human rights organisations sounded the alarm at the draconian approach, but it proved effective in stamping out outbreaks.

Taiwan

Special weapon: Extensive public health infrastructure and experience with SARS

When the pandemic reached Taiwan, the government leapt into action. With SARS still fresh in the national memory, they weren’t taking any chances.

The country owes much of its success to its extensive public health network, which allowed it to quickly activate testing, quarantine and contact-tracing, achieving elimination in the community in April without a lockdown.

Thailand

Special weapon: An army of volunteers

Like Taiwan, Thailand has a strong public health network with a unique advantage: a largely female army of volunteers with basic medical training.

This, combined with lockdowns and sophisticated screening at airports and other public places, gave Thailand an advantage in suppressing COVID-19.

Cyprus

Special weapon: Border controls and lockdowns

Another island state, Cyprus’s success in containing the pandemic owes much to border controls, which have heavily impacted its tourist sector. From relatively early in the pandemic, arrivals had to prove they were virus-free before arriving.

Rwanda

Special weapon: Public trust in the health system

As some of its neighbours battle a caseload 10 times higher, Rwanda has been a low-key COVID success story, with about 14,600 cases and 186 deaths.

The country’s “patient-centric” response and community engagement has been held up as a reason for Rwanda’s success, despite it lacking some of the resources of richer countries.

Iceland

Special weapon: Sophisticated and widespread testing

Iceland’s tiny population of 368,000 allowed it to carry out widespread community testing.

Unlike other European nations that restricted testing to people with symptoms, Iceland cast an open invitation for any of its citizens to be tested. Around 13 per cent of those who initially came forward tested positive. Nearly half of those infections were asymptomatic, which revolutionised understanding of the virus.