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Audio Interview

Planning and response to COVID-19: lessons from China and South-East Asia

Published on May 16, 2023   26 min

A selection of talks on Clinical Practice

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Interviewer: Today, I'm interviewing Professor Annelies Wilder-Smith, seeking answers to, in what ways has planning a management of the response to COVID-19 been different in China and Southeast Asia? Why, and what lessons should we learn from those differences? Professor Wilder-Smith has multiple affiliations. A link to her biography accompanies this interview. Professor Wilder-Smith, thank you for sparing the time. May I start by checking the assumption, was and is planning a management of the response to COVID-19 different in China and Southeast Asia? From each other, and from the rest of the world. Professor Wilder-Smith. Prof. Wilder-Smith: Indeed, Asia had a much swifter response, a better response, and as a result, did not experience the high number of deaths that we saw in North America and in Europe. There are several reasons for this, and that's the purpose of our conversation today. Interviewer: Tell me, what were the reasons? Prof. Wilder-Smith: First, the history. Second, the level of community acceptance. And third, the public health system. Let me start with the history. One of the most striking reasons that Asia had a better pandemic response is that these countries have suffered a large number of epidemics in recent years. Be it the Asian influenza in 1957, the Hong Kong influenza in 1968, Avian influenza, on and off. Then they really experienced Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, SARS, in 2003,
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Planning and response to COVID-19: lessons from China and South-East Asia

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