Leaders were suppressing local professionals’ warnings about how bad it was, and then this first doctor died of the virus. On the other hand, the Chinese state has a lot of enforcement power and has been able to get to a point where the pandemic is under control, and it can reopen its economy. This comes at a huge cost in terms of people’s rights, and democratic countries like South Korea have been able to achieve even better results with less authoritarian means. Nonetheless, China’s performance in the COVID-19 crisis looks pretty disciplined compared to the shambolic US response.
