By not letting it in in the 1st place, perhaps?
I would say, even if population density is a factor, the 2 deciding factors I see in countries who managed it well, thus far, quick decisive actions by government and largely cooperative citizens.
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I think that the cooperative citizens part also stems from having a government that also took it seriously from the beginning. That is certainly not the case in the US or the UK.
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Definitely and its a cycle, because most governments definitely have no clue what was right or wrong, they had to do something from whatever information they had and the citizens had to cooperate first even if they might not agree ir cause inconvenience. That’s very important. Citizens who choose to protest and argue with quick decisive actions would not help much
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The emphasis here has always been about not protecting yourself but protecting others. That creates greater social pressure for others to act in an appropriate manner. There became a social expectation that your poor behaviour could lead to someone’s death. Which drove attitudes and behaviours. Individual freedoms and debates about it only effecting old, it probably won’t effect me, never got any real foothold here.
Communication and support was also on point. Jacinda Arden was clear, preemptive and honest. She gained the respect of a lot of kiwis who would never vote Labour. You also didn’t have the likes of the Telegraph and Daily mail, or Fox news in the US undermining the message. Telling people its just the flu, that the economy was more important.
The lockdown in NZ was also ranked tougher than any other country in the world. Closing everything that really was not essential. Only proper emergency medical/Dental treatment (eg by daughter broke her front tooth and had to wait to end of lockdown). Local Butchers and Green grocers were not open. Only select supermarkets. Travel by car and almost certainly stopped by police.
The flip side was after we eradicated it, we got back to normal very quickly.
NZ was very very lucky as well. Everyone here will tell you that. But it was driven by good leadership, communication and deciding it was worth being more oppressive in lockdowns, to allow recovery faster.
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Yes and I was going to extend this and @ISMF beat me to it in highlighting the press’ role in all of this.
With the likes of Trump and Boris hardly giving a moments thought it allowed the right wing media to basically ignore it or down play it until it was too late and Boris / trump woke from their respective ignorance. By that time we’re behind the curve.
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On the other hand, the population of NZ is more concentrated in urban areas than the population of the UK is - we hear the same argument trotted out here to explain why our vaccination is going poorly, somehow evoking the notion of bush planes needing to fly all across the country. The reality is a much higher level of concentration.
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At a very basic level, I think this is the key. New Zealand set a goal of eradication as a policy response at about the same time that Johnson was suggesting the UK needed to take it on the chin, and Trump was dismissing the level of concern as a hoax. Very few governments actually set eradication as the objective. Those that did have generally done well.
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There’s not much in it though, tbf. 83.6% in the UK, 86.62% in NZ. Or in absolute terms, 55.91m in the UK, 4.27m in NZ.
But in reality it’s not really like for like.
In Auckland, NZ’s most populated city with 1.57m inhabitants, the population density is 1,210/km²
London, with a population of 8,961,989, has a population density of 5,666/km²
There are 122 districts in England with a greater population density than Auckland, 89 of them outside of London (including Portsmouth, Southampton, Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Luton, Leicester, Nottingham, Birmingham etc).
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NZ is just one of those who did very well and other countries like Taiwan and Vietnam and Australia etc which have done well this far, but have different government styles, different cultures etc but yet successful based on that 2 factors I mentioned. The rest of the world should take notice even if you don’t have to replicate exactly what they do
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Potentially a great British success story:
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The first major UK unilateral trade deal post Brexit.
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Looking at number of the major pandemics from the 20th Century, most seem to have a 2-4 life cycle.
The interesting bit, which I might have interpreted totally wrong is that the life cycle of pandemics appears to have gotten shorter in the later parts of the century compared to the earlier ones.
There are a number of factors that might be in play to sway the life cycle of a pandemic, including economic, scientific knowledge and understanding, medical treatment, information sharing and the spead at which data can be shared with large numbers of experts from around the world. But then you also need to factor in individual stupidity, selfishness, ego and general cuntiness (which we have seen a hell of a lot of in the last 12 months) thinking it won’t affect them, so could that undo all the positive gains modern society has made in its ability to better handle a global problem compared to previous generations?
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How long did that period last, mate?
I seriously cant understand any value in trying to grasp at any thread that downgrades New Zealand’s response to this?
On one hand you have a government that took it seriously. On the other you have a PM that decided to go on holiday.
The differences are so fundamental at a governance level, that in my opinion every other metric just stinks of trying to make excuses. Sure there are different challenges but at its most fundamental level relative success is all about who took it seriously against those that decided to ignore it or take the path of least resistance.
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I agree their response was much better than ours (given this seems to be aimed at me). I’m just pointing out the further factors in NZ’s favour that enabled their approach to be even more optimum.
Pointless ignoring factors such as geography, population or population density which are massively to NZ’s advantage here.
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We were 6 weeks at level 4, then we moved to level 3.
Level 3 was closer to the highest level lockdown in the UK. This was still very high level of restrictions, but Butchers and green grocers where now allowed to open. You could also order things online to be delivered (not allowed at level 4) It was at this level for a further month. You still had to stay local, and almost all other stores remained closed.
After that we went to level 2 which allowed normal non essential shops and cafes began to open (from memory bars were not allowed till level 1). Markets remained closed, or anywhere where groups of people could not be controlled. But people could travel to different regions and see family.
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I think you can once the decision to be proactive is made. Closing borders for example is a relatively easy exercise but the decision was taken to ignore this obvious step.
as I said, after taking the decision to take this seriously everything else is, at its most fundamental level quite easy. The first step is always the hardest.
But we have a government that only seems to be able to move quickly when they can give vast amounts of public money to their friends. Public health is, at best secondary.
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I get what you are saying. However, Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam has similar population density or some stats site even put it at a higher density than London and a country that is roughly 1/3 more population than the UK is performing way way better than alot of countries and mega cities. So while that is a factor, it also shows that there are many other factors, that can mitigate that if done properly.
But I get what you are saying, the virus being by nature human transmissible, lesser humans cramped into an area could mean an easier managed virus transmission. But I think the point some of us are making is that or at least myself is that prompt governance and cooperative citizens can greatly mitigate that factor.
EDIT: And don’t get me wrong, its not just the UK who needs to learn, there are many many many countries out there who need to be better. The key thing here is learn because scientists are already warning of Disease X which can potentially be worse than this virus.
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One of the counter-intuitive things is there are a few studies which indicate population density dos not correlate disease spread. Common wisdom seems not to hold true for this COVID epidemic.
But you are correct NZ does have some innate advantages. In my day dreaming moments before I migrated here I thought it would be a good place if a zombie apocalypse ever happens 
Distance meant that for the most part NZ was self sufficient for food, energy, and making things like PPE. If you look at the amount of lorry’s that travel from the EU throughout the UK. The dependence on other countries for basics. It’s a clear stream for disease to spread.
The logistics of changing that would have been immense.
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