Living with a pandemic 46

 South Korea: A Covid-19 success story

From the time of the initial outbreak of Covid-19 a year ago, South Korea has been a leader in the control of the spread of infection and the resultant death rate.

At present (18 January 2021) the country has had 72,729 cases reported and 1,264 deaths. With a population of 51.71 million people, that represents 24.4 deaths per million. One of the lowest on the planet.

How did they achieve this?

Much of the low rate of spread was voluntary. People stayed home or away from others once they had seen the results of the experience in Wuhan, China.

The government put in place rigorous and extensive programs for testing and contact tracing using rules allowing the use of phones and credit cards to determine prior movements of people. This is unlike many western nations where people are more concerned with “privacy” issues than with national health emergencies. But the South Korean programs have probably been the most responsible for the containment of the virus along with the support of the population.

From top to bottom then from left to right: a queue in front of a pharmacy in Wonju for the distribution of masks, a drone of disinfection in Seongnam, a closed elementary school in Daegu, protest inscriptions against Shincheonji on a car, video call between members of the South Korean government, manufacturing of masks in Busan, 2020 South Korean legislative election, admission of a symptomatic patient to a hospital in Busan, portable medical negative pressure isolation stretcher in a fire station in Hoengseong, firefighters' training in Daegu, thermal camera at the entrance to Wonju hospital, temperature check at Incheon International Airport, drive-through testing in Gyeongju.

Testing numbers have been estimated a 26 to 120 times higher than in other countries in the first few months of the pandemic. Innovative drive-through centres were opened to facilitate people getting tested quickly and efficiently.

Anyone thought to have been near to infected individuals were alerted, prompting immediate testing. Travel into and out of the country was discouraged. Once identified with the virus those infected were required to go into isolation in government shelters.

There was no general lockdown of businesses but there was early closure of schools and other facilities where people would normally gather in large numbers, such as gyms and movie theatres. Major sporting activities wee allowed to go ahead in April with no fans in the stands. Easing of restrictions was only done when information about the rate of infections was better known and could be controlled.

Through April 2020, daily increases in the number of new cases were kept to single digits.

Even with the higher numbers in south Korea’s third wave of infection, the number of new cases is still well under any other country of similar size. Canada, for example, has had 18,014 deaths to date, or 479 per million people. We average over 6,000 cases per day, over 10 times the number in South Korea.

Ongoing testing, distribution of information and cooperation of South Korea’s people have combined to allow the country to manage the pandemic very well.

Living with a pandemic 45

 
Living Online…

The online experience was new to many people in 2020. Some even learned new techniques such as group meetings through Zoom and other similar programs. Having to stay home has meant using the Internet to find information, to shop, to communicate and to do many of the things we would normally do in person.

For my part, life has not changed a great deal, other than fewer trips to local restaurants and shops. Not being able to visit with friends and relatives, especially our children and grandchildren, has been the worst experience.

For many years, at least since I retired from the workforce, I have spent a great deal of time online, researching ancestors and writing articles about genealogy. If anything, I have learned about even more places to find records and data. I had seven articles published last year and two so far this year. Two more are scheduled and several others are in draft form at present. And I have made good progress researching the lives of some specific ancestors.

Missing our normal Christmas get-together and unable to share special occasions like our 50^th anniversary, though, was the pits. I don’t want to miss those kinds of things again! We were fortunate that our children and grandchildren could connect online.

In December many countries approved vaccines to combat this deadly infection. Those were developed in record time, compared to past epidemics. So, we are lucky. But it will take almost a year before everyone in Canada, for example, who wants a shot to get one. In most regions, people are now complaining about what they perceive to be slow rollouts of vaccines. That is likely to continue until the Fall.

Infection numbers of Covid-19 have never been higher. World-wide over 90 million cases have been confirmed and 1.9 million people have died from the effects of the virus. This second wave is relentless. Several countries now have reached a mark of over 1,000 deaths per million population. Canada is at 450 per million. Canada’s cases today total 664,606 which represents 3.3% of all tests. Very high!

In Alberta, where I live, there have been over 1,200 deaths, still low compared to other provinces and countries, but still alarming. The pattern still shows the average age of those succumbing is 82 years but there is a greater number of people contracting the disease who are much younger. Everyone is at risk.

Lockdowns and curfews persist everywhere but people still think they can travel freely and without danger to themselves or others they may come in contact with when they get home. Consequently, following each of the major holidays in the past year, there have been spikes in cases.

We are weathering the storm, but you can tell people are more stressed and more worried, as much from the loss of jobs and incomes as from getting sick.

Natural Disasters and Family Misfortunes 20: 1929 Newfoundland Earthquake & Tsunami

 
A recent blog post on Watts Up With That? was titled, Raise your hand if you knew Newfoundland was devastated by a major tsunami in 1929. I had to raise my hand because, probably like many other people, I did not know that.

This is one of those stories that is close to home (at least it is in Canada, if on the other side of the country) which too often we do not study about enough. When I got to looking up the event, I discovered that there is quite a lot of information about the event along with considerable scientific research on the physical aspects of this tsunami and tsunamis in general using this example.

The 1929 tsunami was the result of a magnitude 7.2 earthquake and subsequent slump of debris in the Laurentian Channel on 18 November 1929. The centre of the disturbance was about 150 miles south of Newfoundland.

Map showing intensity of earthquake felt throughout Maritime Canada from 2011 report by Natural Resources Canada

The tsunami generated by the earthquake struck southern Newfoundland about two and a half hours after the event. It came in three pulses causing sea level to rise over 20 feet. At the heads of inlets, the water was over 40 feet higher than normal. According to the government report, “In more than 40 villages in southern Newfoundland homes, ships and businesses were destroyed. More than 280,000 pounds of salt cod were lost. Total property losses were estimated at more than one million 1929 dollars [$14.5 million today].”

Map showing extent of damage along the Burin Peninsula of Southern Newfoundland from 2011 report by Natural Resources Canada

The Burin Peninsula had been isolated prior to the earthquake when a storm the previous weekend had broken the one strand of telegraph wire that connected the area to the rest of the province. The tsunami took care of the rest of the communications infrastructure along the southern coast.

Some damage from the earthquake and tidal wave had been reported in towns further up Placentia Bay to the northeast, but news of the disaster along Burin Peninsula was not relayed for over two days. Newspapers across the country shouted reports of the disaster which had killed 27 people and caused untold destruction.

Because of the market crash the previous month, much attention from the news media was being directed at the international economy. What was happening in the natural world did not get much notice. And being cut off from the world by broken telegraph lines on land and submerged cables running across the ocean floor of the Grand Banks. Over several hours following the earthquake, 12 trans-Atlantic cables were cut.

Map showing location of broken cables resulting from the earthquake and debris flows; source Earth Magazine website

Eventually the world heard about the disaster and relief came in the form of food, blankets, medical supplies, and doctors and nurses. Some areas partially recovered, in terms of infrastructure at least, in a few years; others never did. Many families were impacted and a few entirely wiped out.

These kinds of events are not unique. They have happened along coastal margins for hundreds of millions of years. They achieve notoriety when communities are destroyed, and people are killed. Some events may go unnoticed by the outside world for years because of competing news stories, their remote location or, in this case, the break in communications.