I don’t like to like things that many other people like, unless we are talking about donuts, so my pride and delight in New Zealand’s management of the COVID virus is tinged with jealousy that everyone else sees how excellent they are too. But I will get over it. Which must be a relief for them.
There are many refreshing factors in their response. First, I love to see a woman running things well. Second, in our current state of decline – irrationality, greed, and inhumane treatment of anyone who does not resemble the US’s corrupt, rich, male and white(ish) porcine leader – a rational and well-informed response to anything is soothing.
Third, efficient decision-making is an aphrodisiac, like standing in a white and crumb-less Danish kitchen:
“[New Zealand] shut its borders to foreigners March 19. Two days later, [Prime Minister Jacinda] Ardern delivered a televised address from her office…announcing a coronavirus response alert plan involving four stages, with a full lockdown being Level 4.
A group of influential leaders got on the phone with her the following day to urge moving to Level 4. “We were hugely worried about what was happening in Italy and Spain,” said one of them, Stephen Tindall, founder of the Warehouse, New Zealand’s largest retailer. “If we didn’t shut down quickly enough, the pain was going to go on for a very long time…It’s inevitable that we will have to shut down anyway, so we would rather it be sharp and short.”
On March23, a Monday, Ardern delivered another statement and gave the country 48 hours to prepare for a Level 4 lockdown.”
Their peak day of new cases totaled 89. So I guess that worked out.
Their health minister, considering himself an exception case to the quarantine – how American! – went to the beach, violating quarantine, and in a shockingly reasonable and immediate response, was publicly criticized and demoted by the prime minister. Corruption, response. I have stars in my eyes.
(The same thing happened in another favorite country, Scotland. Consequences for wrong action? Can you even imagine?)
In the rest of the world and across history, women remain irritated at how poorly men are managing things without their input and leadership:
Displaced 
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