well the virus was first detected as we
remember
in the city of wuhan in china a little
over a year ago it was late
in 2019 when the first reports came
through and the outbreak spread very
quickly across the world in the first
months of 2020
and was declared a global pandemic by
the world health organization
on the 11th of march last year so how
does the uk
death toll compare with the rest of the
world and what can explain why some
countries have been
hit by the pandemic so much harder than
others our science editor
david shukman has this analysis
the pandemic has touched every nation
the virus claiming lives as it spread
across the globe
and despite the arrival of vaccines the
toll
continues to be heavy more than two
million people around the world have now
died of covid so far
but some countries have suffered far
more than others and the best way to
measure that
is to look at the number of deaths in
relation to the size of the population
so vietnam new zealand australia and
norway
have seen 10 deaths or fewer per 100 000
people
in fact more than half the countries of
the world have recorded losses at this
relatively low level
denmark germany poland and many others
have lost more
but brazil the us italy and the uk
are among those with the greatest losses
of all at least a hundred coveted deaths
for every hundred thousand people so
what might explain this
a key question is the government
response and how fast it was
some countries were quick to enforce
social distancing
and other measures like masks for
example and the results have been clear
there's a lot more virus a thousand
population
in the uk and the us
in my view than there is in some of the
east asian countries which have reacted
more rapidly and robustly
when the outbreak starts planning for
the pandemic is another factor
and how effective those preparations
were
countries hit by the sars virus back in
2003
learned lessons and got ready so did
nations struck by ebola
britain provided them with expertise and
finance
to help look out for the next disease we
finance those institutions
that help respond to outbreaks yet
we really don't listen to our own advice
so we didn't listen to the institutions
that we financed that then said
to do this you really need to implement
effective track and trace and do that
quickly swiftly as possible
and then there's the controversial
question of borders and were they closed
many countries did shut their frontiers
but the advice from the world health
organization
was to keep them open because by then
the virus would have slipped through
anyway
but that guidance was often ignored some
states did it
states such as new zealand australia
they did it
and it benefited them in terms of
minimizing
the risk of infection from those coming
outside of the country
so it really raises this question of was
this advice around borders
coming from the world health
organization effective
and did it harm those countries that
didn't close off its borders
how different countries have responded
will be examined for years to come
but right now the struggle against the
virus is far from over
david shuckman bbc news