CIAO DATE: 12/2010
November 2010
Centre for Non-Traditional Security (NTS) Studies
Both the US and China responded to the 2009 H1N1 pandemic in a decisive and swift manner. However, they handled the crisis with fundamentally different strategies. From the start of the crisis, the US approach was mitigation, focusing on minimising the impact by maximising surge capacity. By contrast, China’s response until September 2009 was characterised by an aggressive containment approach that sought to establish barriers against the spread of the disease. A comparison of the effectiveness of the two strategies clearly points to the inferiority of the containment strategy in handling the H1N1 pandemic. It is true that decision-makers tend to err on the side of caution when encountering an unpredictable and potentially disastrous novel disease, but that is no justification for allowing risk assessment and risk communication be dominated by worst-case scenarios, or allowing domestic political concerns to prevail over science in decision-making. A comparison between the US and China also suggests the importance of beefing up core surveillance and response capabilities in a coherent and sustainable manner.
Resource link: Comparing the H1N1 Crises and Responses in the US and China [PDF] - 274K