Did we go too far?

As many other countries, apart from the epicenter China, were infected with the novel coronavirus, the WHO finally admitted that it is a global pandemic and truly it is that despite not every nation in the world but all continents with human habitat have become infected areas now. Interestingly it seems China not only "exported" the disease but also the way of the public health handling. Many countries now mimic the sealing up of districts or even cities with outbreak. Some like Italy and Spain even went to next level to seal up the whole country and imposed residential quarantine in the whole nation. It seems Herd Behaviour is in play again now, and as usual.

There is a word of wisdom saying that one's tonic could be the poison of other. Sealing up the entire city or even a nation could do more harm than good when without a thorough examination on the long term effect but just brainlessly and blindly follow what China did on the blockage in the Hubei province where the Wuhan City is as well as the outcome. So far it seems China has contained the outbreak within the Hubei province by sealing up and imposing residential quarantine over the 59.2 millions of population. The success is indeed a Pyrrhic victory and it was the last resort of the lesser evil option when the patients are way much more than the capacity of the local medical system. Most of all, this measure would not has become effective without a powerful central government, or in other name, a totalitarian administration. This is exactly what the democratic nations are lack of.

The effectiveness of the Hubei blockage also lies on the China context that she is a vast country with 13+ billions of population. The powerful central government can coordinate its resources other than the Hubei province effectively and efficiently to implement whatever measure deemed to be necessary to deal with the outbreak in a relatively small fraction of the whole nation. Sealing up an entire province with 59.2 millions of population could be a detrimental hit on its economy but it is still not up to an arm or leg to the whole nation. Without such background the sheep nations who brainlessly follow what China did could just put themselves into an economical impasse. Residential quarantine means no productivity at all for the entire nation or the related district, without the effective and efficient support from an outside source, their economy could quickly be suffocated. Revenue lost during the sealing up is gone forever like barber shops, cinemas, restaurants, gyms, amusement parks and transportation of all sorts...etc and even after the outbreak the future consumption just cannot compensate the already lost revenue so recession in those countries or districts is literally something for sure.

As what I put in my post Is A Trade Worthwhile that we should examine the probability as well as the payout whenever we decide to bet or invest. The same theory holds true when facing a risk that consideration should be put on how likely and what the damage will be. This novel coronavirus is said to be highly infectious so if there is no enough protective gears for everybody then the probability of contracting the disease is very high. This is exactly the case allover the world but the key point lies on the extent of the damage even if infected. The mortality rate, according to the WHO and the factual statistic from most of the infected countries also show that it is around 3-4% as a whole. This mortality rate is based on death toll against the confirmed infection but it is quite sure that the actual infection rate must be much higher than what it is known because many countries are just in shortage of the testing capability to verify all the vectors, especially for those asymptomatic. The disease could be less fatal than it appears to be, definitely far less than a common flu.

We must admit that we are living in an imperfect world that we cannot have the cake and eat it too. The experience for those areas with earlier outbreak could be a good reference to the late comers.  China is the epicentre and Hong Kong is indeed very much synchronized on the infection. Despite there is no statutory citywide residential quarantine here in Hong Kong yet some businesses have  virtually nearly come to a halt like the tourism, hospitality, dining and most retailing except grocery. So the impact on those nationwide and citywide sealed up is unavoidably comprehensive and even bigger than that on Hong Kong. Some medical experts already hinted that this virus is not going to subside soon or even probably to be with us for good. In that case, is the world really sustainable with the current mode of counter measures?

Did we go too far in light of the economic damage vs the public health crisis?