One key factor according to the Swedish minister for foreign affairs, Ann Linde, is Sweden’s politically independent public agencies—and the high level of public trust in them. For the last 400 years, Sweden has had a system with small ministries but big agencies, like the Public Health Agency, which explains why there is an epidemiologist and not a prime minister at the helm of this effort.
“In this case the Public Health authorities gives advice and recommendation that people follow,” she says on the phone adding that the authorities also have a lot of trust in people.
“We have a very low level of corruption, so there is no reason for authorities to give expert advice that wouldn’t be the best for people and society. And this is the main reason why people trust authorities.”
So when the authorities “recommend” people not leave Stockholm during Easter it’s not regarded as a tip, but as something “You Should Not Do" (Schibbye 2020).

After five terrifying days of market turmoil, the weekend of 14-15 March was a moment for central banks around the world to coordinate their response. What everyone wanted was dollars, so it was above all the Federal Reserve that needed to take the lead. And as its chair, Powell did. He called an unscheduled press conference for the afternoon of 15 March. What he announced was remarkable.
With immediate effect, the Fed was cutting interest rates to zero – something it had done just once before, at the height of the crisis in 2008. To stabilize the US Treasury bonds market, it would be buying $700bn in a new round of so-called quantitative easing. And it would start big, buying $80bn by 17 March. In the space of just 48 hours, it would spend more on treasuries than the Fed spent in most months in the aftermath of 2008 (Tooze 2020)

There is a simple reason for this. For all the responsibility vested in the WHO, it has little power. Unlike international bodies such as the World Trade Organization, the WHO, which is a specialised body of the UN, has no ability to bind or sanction its members. Its annual operating budget, about $2bn in 2019, is smaller than that of many university hospitals, and split among a dizzying array of public health and research projects. The WHO is less like a military general or elected leader with a strong mandate, and more like an underpaid sports coach wary of “losing the dressing room”, who can only get their way by charming, grovelling, cajoling and occasionally pleading with the players to do as they say (Buranyi 2020)

Here I am compiling news articles about COVID 19 that connect in some way to things I discuss in my IR and comparative classes, or they are just articles that I thought were interesting. I am sharing these articles via email with students but thought I would also compile them here. There is little rhyme or reason for the articles, just things I stumble upon and think is worth sharing with my students. Below are the email messages copied and pasted to this blog.

The first one I shared with my POLS 121 course already but thought I would share here since some of you are not in POLS 121. In this article Cynthia Enloe discussing why using the term "war on Covid" and war analogies are problematic.

Here is a really good BBC article discussing a brief history of pandemics. Here is the most interesting quote for me: "If these numbers shock, it’s because today epidemics are rarely discussed in history classes, while in the not so distant past, they were simply a terrible fact of life. There are few memorials to the victims of disease." I would add that, in general (or at least in my experience), global health is discussed very briefly in introduction to IR course. I am sure there are exceptions, but most textbooks have small sections or a small chapter tacked in the end of the book. I remember teaching about it during the H1N1 fears, but eventually I moved away from discussing pandemics at length in class, even when the Ebola scare happened. In the early 2010s I even showed the movie Contagion in class (the first half hour is pretty much what is happening now, then it gets Hollywood). Maybe this is more for me, since I feel I dropped the ball talking about this in my classes, and I am sure now it will be a big point of discussion for the years to come.  

This Politico article talked about the Trump administration ignoring a "pandemic playbook." When I am reading this, I am less worried about the criticism of Trump's response and more on general ideas of bureaucracies and standard operating procedures.
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This Atlantic article from March 25th has been shared widely among my social media circles. Here are some good quotes:

"To contain such a pathogen, nations must develop a test and use it to identify infected people, isolate them, and trace those they’ve had contact with. That is what South Korea, Singapore, and Hong Kong did to tremendous effect."  

"Italy and Spain offer grim warnings about the future. Hospitals are out of room, supplies, and staff. Unable to treat or save everyone, doctors have been forced into the unthinkable: rationing care to patients who are most likely to survive, while letting others die. The U.S. has fewer hospital beds per capita than Italy."

"These shortages are happening because medical supplies are made-to-order and depend on byzantine international supply chains that are currently straining and snapping. Hubei province in China, the epicenter of the pandemic, was also a manufacturing center of medical masks."

"Inequalities will widen: People with low incomes will be hardest-hit by social-distancing measures, and most likely to have the chronic health conditions that increase their risk of severe infections."

"After 9/11, the world focused on counterterrorism. After COVID-19, attention may shift to public health. Expect to see a spike in funding for virology and vaccinology, a surge in students applying to public-health programs, and more domestic production of medical supplies. Expect pandemics to top the agenda at the United Nations General Assembly." Expect my POLS 121 to talk about global health 😷

Here are two Monkey Cage articles about China that I think are interesting. Monkey Cage was created by political scientists and was then purchased by the Washington Post. If you are having trouble opening the articles (paywall) let me know and I can send you a PDF.

China’s coronavirus response could build public support for its government, written by Dan Chen, a friend of mine who is also a KU Ph.D. 

China is also relying on propaganda to tackle the covid-19 crisis, written by Haifeng Huang of the University of California, Merced. 

An article from Reason provides some interesting insights on the possible economic impacts of th.e pandemic. Here is the link to the article. The article focuses solely on the impact on the US economy, discussing research on the economic impact of the 1918 pandemic. Here is the concluding paragraph that I think is important to emphasize:

​"Given our highly mobile and connected society, any future influenza pandemic is likely to be more severe in its reach, and perhaps in its virulence, than the 1918 influenza despite improvements in health care over the past 90 years….Unfortunately, a 2005 report suggests that the United States is not prepared for an influenza pandemic. Although federal, state and local governments in the United States have started to focus on preparedness in recent years, it is fair to say that progress has been slow, especially at local levels of government."

This last article is from the BBC and discusses the fears that the epicenter of the disease in Italy will move from the north to poorer regions in the south. At the end of the article there is this small tidbit about Germany: "Germany's relatively low death rate was largely due to the high number of tests being carried out, said Christian Drosten, head of the Charite University Hospital's Institute of Virology in Berlin." Next week I will try to find some articles that discuss Germany more closely, and I encourage you all to take a look at what happened in South Korea as well to understand more about what is "working" right now.