Lesson‐Drawing from New Zealand and Covid‐19: The Need for Anticipatory Policy Making

Mazey, Sonia; Richardson, Jeremy

doi:10.1111/1467-923x.12893

Cited by 79 publications

(73 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…The moralization of C19 elimination efforts is evident in public depictions of C19 response strategies (see Luttrell et al, 2018 for benefits of framing arguments in moral terms). For example, New Zealand's early health-minded elimination approach is lauded as moral for its efficacy ( Mazey & Richardson, 2020 ). In contrast, herd-immunity approaches, such as that fronted by Sweden and the Great Barrington Declaration, have been publicly condemned as immoral (BBC, 2020; Bergmann, 2020 ) and unethical ( Resnick, 2020 ).…”

Section: Theoretical Foundationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Moralization of Covid-19 health response: Asymmetry in tolerance for human costs

Graso

Chen

Reynolds

2021

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

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We hypothesized that because Covid-19 (C19) remains an urgent and visible threat, efforts to combat its negative health consequences have become moralized. This moralization of health-based efforts may generate asymmetries in judgement, whereby harmful by-products of those efforts (i.e., instrumental harm) are perceived as more acceptable than harm resulting from non-C19 efforts, such as prioritizing the economy or non-C19 issues. We tested our predictions in two experimental studies. In Study 1, American participants evaluated the same costs (public shaming, deaths and illnesses, and police abuse of power) as more acceptable when they resulted from efforts to minimize C19's health impacts, than when they resulted from non-health C19 efforts (e.g., prioritizing economic costs) or efforts unrelated to C19 (e.g., reducing traffic deaths). In Study 2, New Zealand participants less favorably evaluated the quality of a research proposal empirically questioning continuing a C19 elimination strategy in NZ than one questioning abandoning an elimination strategy, although both proposals contained the same amount of methodology information. This finding suggests questioning elimination approaches is morally condemned, a similar response to that found when sacred values are questioned. In both studies, condition effects were mediated by lowered moral outrage in response to costs resulting from pursuing health-minded C19 efforts. Follow-up analyses revealed that both heightened personal concern over contracting C19 and liberal ideology were associated with greater asymmetries in human cost evaluation. Altogether, results suggest reducing or eliminating C19 have become moralized, generating asymmetries in evaluations of human suffering.

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Section: Theoretical Foundationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Moralization of Covid-19 health response: Asymmetry in tolerance for human costs

Graso

Chen

Reynolds

2021

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

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“…Comparing these elements helps explain the international reputation of the UK and US for delayed and insufficient responses. It may also encourage lesson-learning from: more successful COVID-19 responses in countries such as New Zealand, South Korea, and Singapore (Mazey and Richardson 2020;Kim et al 2020;Woo 2020); or, previous public health crises in relation to public trust in government policy on issues such as Ebola and BSE (Blair, Morse, and Tsai 2017;Sell et al 2016;Forbes 2004) or policymaker trust in experts during H1N1 vaccination (Baekkeskov 2016). However, while there is much for the UK and US to learn, most comparative studies do not define trust well enough to show how it fits into the story (Powell and King-Hill 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

COVID-19: effective policymaking depends on trust in experts, politicians, and the public

Cairney

Wellstead

2020

Policy Design and Practice

141

121

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In a crisis, almost-instant choices about who to trust or distrust could make a difference between life and death. Trust is necessary for cooperation, coordination, social order, and to reduce the need for coercive state imposition. During a pandemic, people need to trust experts to help them understand and respond to the problem, governments to coordinate policy instruments and make choices about levels of coercion, and citizens as they cooperate to minimize infection. We compare these general requirements with specific developments in the UK and US, identifying: the variable reliance by elected politicians on scientific experts, worrying levels of distrust in elected leaders, and a shift from a trust-based to more impositional forms of government action (with more variation in responses in the US). While trust is difficult to define and measure, these examples show that people miss it when it is gone.

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“…Therefore, the COVID-19 mortality rate could be lowered. Generally, high-income countries such as South Korea and Japan possessed sufficient health facilities and manpower ( Table 8 ), except for New Zealand and Singapore that had a lower number in terms of healthcare facilities [ 66 , 67 ]. However, the lower income country like Vietnam managed to control the pandemic, probably due to its governments’ swift strategy as they recognized its inability to contain a high amount of cases if the pandemic became serious [ 68 ].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Factors Influencing Asia-Pacific Countries’ Success Level in Curbing COVID-19: A Review Using a Social–Ecological System (SES) Framework

Ling

Suhud

Leng

et al. 2021

IJERPH

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Little attention has been paid to the impacts of institutional–human–environment dimensions on the outcome of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) abatement. Through the diagnostic social–ecological system (SES) framework, this review paper aimed to investigate what and how the multifaceted social, physical, and governance factors affected the success level of seven selected Asia-Pacific countries (namely, South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Indonesia, and New Zealand) in combatting COVID-19. Drawing on statistical data from the Our World In Data website, we measured the COVID-19 severity or abatement success level of the countries on the basis of cumulative positive cases, average daily cases, and mortality rates for the period of 1 February 2020 to 30 June 2020. A qualitative content analysis using three codes, i.e., present (P), partially present (PP), and absent (A) for each SES attribute, as well as score calculation and rank ordering for government response effectiveness and the abatement success level across the countries, was undertaken. Not only did the standard coding process ensure data comparability but the data were deemed substantially reliable with Cohen’s kappa of 0.76. Among 13 attributes of the SES factors, high facility adequacy, comprehensive COVID-19 testing policies, strict lockdown measures, imposition of penalty, and the high trust level towards the government seemed to be significant in determining the COVID-19 severity in a country. The results show that Vietnam (ranked first) and New Zealand (ranked second), with a high presence of attributes/design principles contributing to high-level government stringency and health and containment indices, successfully controlled the virus, while Indonesia (ranked seventh) and Japan (ranked sixth), associated with the low presence of design principles, were deemed least successful. Two lessons can be drawn: (i) having high number of P for SES attributes does not always mean a panacea for the pandemic; however, it would be detrimental to a country if it lacked them severely, and (ii) some attributes (mostly from the governance factor) may carry higher weightage towards explaining the success level. This comparative study providing an overview of critical SES attributes in relation to COVID-19 offers novel policy insights, thus helping policymakers devise more strategic, coordinated measures, particularly for effective country preparedness and response in addressing the current and the future health crisis.

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Lesson‐Drawing from New Zealand and Covid‐19: The Need for Anticipatory Policy Making

Cited by 79 publications

References 6 publications

Moralization of Covid-19 health response: Asymmetry in tolerance for human costs

Moralization of Covid-19 health response: Asymmetry in tolerance for human costs

COVID-19: effective policymaking depends on trust in experts, politicians, and the public

Factors Influencing Asia-Pacific Countries’ Success Level in Curbing COVID-19: A Review Using a Social–Ecological System (SES) Framework

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