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posted by Fnord666 on Monday May 18 2020, @10:08AM   Printer-friendly

COVID-19 Has Blown Away the Myth About 'First' and 'Third' World Competence:

One of the planet's – and Africa's – deepest prejudices is being demolished by the way countries handle COVID-19.

For as long as any of us remember, everyone "knew" that "First World" countries – in effect, Western Europe and North America – were much better at providing their citizens with a good life than the poor and incapable states of the "Third World". "First World" has become shorthand for competence, sophistication and the highest political and economic standards.

[...] So we should have expected the state-of-the-art health systems of the "First World", spurred on by their aware and empowered citizens, to handle COVID-19 with relative ease, leaving the rest of the planet to endure the horror of buckling health systems and mass graves.

We have seen precisely the opposite.

[...] [Britain and the US] have ignored the threat. When they were forced to act, they sent mixed signals to citizens which encouraged many to act in ways which spread the infection. Neither did anything like the testing needed to control the virus. Both failed to equip their hospitals and health workers with the equipment they needed, triggering many avoidable deaths.

The failure was political. The US is the only rich country with no national health system. An attempt by former president Barack Obama to extend affordable care was watered down by right-wing resistance, then further gutted by the current president and his party. Britain's much-loved National Health Service has been weakened by spending cuts. Both governments failed to fight the virus in time because they had other priorities.

And yet, in Britain, the government's popularity ratings are sky high and it is expected to win the next election comfortably. The US president is behind in the polls but the contest is close enough to make his re-election a real possibility. Can there be anything more typically "Third World" than citizens supporting a government whose actions cost thousands of lives?


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by meustrus on Tuesday May 19 2020, @06:49PM

    by meustrus (4961) on Tuesday May 19 2020, @06:49PM (#996457)

    China is the longest-lasting civilization in the history of the world.

    You may look at them right now and think they're a bunch of 20th century communists who, through copying "the west", salvaged a functional economy out of the wreckage of a failed state. That would be a huge mistake.

    The communist party is just the latest in a long series of inheritors of the Chinese national system of governance. There have been many dynasties. There will be many more. Maybe they're done with monarchy and this "democracy" concept is going to stick around as the basis for their legitimacy, but the system of government is unchanged.

    China was China back when England was a distant, often deep-frozen backwater. China was China back when America was full of nomads congregating in great cities that are now archeological sites. China was China back when the whole of Europe and the Middle East still believed in overlapping pantheons of minor gods.

    Maybe "the so-called 1st world countries" had a good swing at it for a few hundred years. Maybe we've even done something great and profound, and the world will forever be better for it.

    But before China cherry-picked industrialization from Europe, Europe cherry-picked gunpowder from China.

    Just about the only thing China did wrong was fail to recognize Europe as a competing power in the 19th century. It's understandable. Europe was a primitive backwater for 90% of the time China had been a magnificent empire. How could Europe possibly catch up?

    So China got their butts kicked in the Opium War, and Europe drank their milkshake for a hundred years.

    They've done a pretty good job of making up for lost time. If you think they're going to stop there, you're just as naïve as the Chinese were about Europe. You'd better wise up before they drink your milkshake.

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