A tale of two pandemics: Is COVID-19 repeating the mistakes of HIV's past?

Rwanda, a country with the same population of Ohio, has emerged as an example of how to slow the spread of coronavirus, with only 1,500 cases reported so far. Besides initiating a lockdown, implementing free testing, and recruiting community health care workers, police, and college students to be contact tracers, officials also used "the same structure, same people, same infrastructure and laboratory diagnostics" that had been working to contain the spread of HIV.

At the start of the coronavirus pandemic, public health officials in Flint, Michigan began tracking the demographics of those who were testing positive for the virus in order to better align the county's public health action and outreach. In doing so, officials realized that a lack of access to testing in predominately Black neighborhoods was a contributing factor and decided to launch mobile testing, barrier-free sites, and other interventions at the state level.

A group of health care workers and social workers formed to help connect hard-to-reach communities in Hawaii to COVID-19 testing and information about the pandemic. So far, they have been able to test more than 200 people who were showing symptoms or who had been at high risk of exposure. The director of the Hawaii Public Housing Authority has also reported that compliance with mask-wearing and other safety measures has increased since the effort began.

As the COVID-19 pandemic picked up across the world, Senegal, taking lessons from its experiences with Ebola, acted quickly. Measures like hard travel restrictions and lockdowns, daily information briefings and broadcasts, subsidizing hotels for isolations and quarantine, fever checks at most public locations, and cheap and accessible testing. Key to all of this has been the localized context – understanding what will work best for Senegal citizens, especially those in remote areas.

South Korea’s rapid response to COVID-19 shares many successes that can be duplicated by other countries. Its main advantage came from its ability to create tests rapidly, which could happen quickly because of preparedness changes made after the 2015 MERS outbreak. It then scaled up drive-through testing, information-sharing about infected individuals’ location, and social distancing measures.

Taiwan, Singapore, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Japan all implemented similar comprehensive public health emergency plans that successfully reduced the spread of coronavirus in each region. Although each country used tactics such as travel restrictions, widespread testing, transparent communication, and quarantine protocols, Taiwan and South Korea are emerging as models for other countries due to the structure of democracy.

The testing efficiency and protocols implemented in South Korea to slow the spread of coronavirus have proven to be successful, with the latest reports of the country showing that reports of cases have leveled off. Combining "a single-payer health-care system and a sweeping infectious-disease law," the country was able rapidly identify potential cases and enact isolation in order to contain the spread of the virus.

The San Francisco Bay Area has had fewer COVID-19 deaths than would be expected for such a densely populated area, largely by "drawing on resources and expertise that predated the coronavirus pandemic." Unlike other large cities, the Bay Area was able to quickly identify where hotspots may emerge, and initiate changes – such as allowing only one entrance to hospitals and not using traveling certified nursing assistants in multiple nursing homes. City health officials also increased outreach to at-risk minority neighborhoods, after seeing the virus disproportionately impacting these communities elsewhere.

When nursing homes in North Carolina realized that the coronavirus pandemic had arrived within the state, facility managers and staff began enacting measures to prevent the spread of the virus amongst their residents. Adapting existing infection control and prevention plans, many were able to ensure a robust supply of PPE and reinforce their staffing numbers, which has paid off as most of the facilities have avoided outbreaks.

Many countries in Africa have been able to contain the spread of COVID-19 due to lessons learned from fighting the Ebola epidemic. Although not all African countries have implemented successful strategies, those that have seen success credit strong government leadership, community compliance, and a physically healthy population.