REFLECTIONS ON THE IMPACT OF THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC IN ASIA AND SOME LESSONS FROM THE ASIAN GOVERNANCE MODEL

The key factor that determines the health impact of the pandemic, is therefore the efficient allocation of a country’s resources in battling with the pandemic, and in preventing the number of infections from rising to the point that the health system’s capacity is exceeded. [...] By prioritising the health of their economies over the health of their peoples, they are effectively “putting cart before horse”, because the longer their economies are impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic as a result of their failure to impose effective lockdowns, the larger is the overall impact they stand to bear. [...] It is in this regard that we also stress the paramount importance of subsidiarity, with national governments taking accountability in implementing the necessary measures to curb the both the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, and for ensuring sufficient resources to support the treatment of individuals who contract the virus, especially those who are poorest. [...] Although the advanced economies have taken the lion’s share of the available vaccines, global security from the threat of new variants of the COVID virus will only occur when most of the global population has been vaccinated. [...] COVID-19 has infected 9.1% of the US population and 6.7% of the United Kingdom’s; in contrast, it only infected less than 0.01% of the China’s population even if it was first spotted in China; it impacted less than 0.1% of the local population in Singapore,53 and less than 1% of Japan’s, South Korea’s and the Philippines’ populations.54 The evidence above highlights the effects of divergent perspe.