Lessons from Taiwan and New Zealand health responses to COVID-19

• Dr Jennifer Summers
• Dr Hao-Yuan Cheng
• Professor Hsien-Ho Lin
• Dr Lucy Telfar Barnard
• Dr Amanda Kvalsvig
• Professor Nick Wilson
• et al.
• 
  

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanwpc.2020.100044

PDF: https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S2666-6065%2820%2930044-4

With the extensive infrastructure it had established before COVID-19, it appears Taiwan was in a better position than New Zealand to respond effectively to the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite Taiwan's closer proximity to the source of the pandemic, and its high population density, it experienced a substantially lower case rate of 20.7 per million compared with New Zealand's 278.0 per million. Rapid and systematic implementation of control measures, in particular effective border management (exclusion, screening, quarantine/isolation), contact tracing, systematic quarantine/isolation of potential and confirmed cases, cluster control, active promotion of mass masking, and meaningful public health communication, are likely to have been instrumental in limiting pandemic spread. Furthermore, the effectiveness of Taiwan's public health response has meant that to date no lockdown has been implemented, placing Taiwan in a stronger economic position both during and post-COVID-19 compared with New Zealand, which had seven weeks of national lockdown (at Alert Levels 4 and 3). In comparison to Taiwan, New Zealand appeared to take a less vigorous response to this pandemic during its early stages, only introducing border management measures in a stepwise manner. ...

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanwpc/article/PIIS2666-6065(20)30044-4/fulltext#seccesectitle0010