Now that I think about it. A lot of Covid response in 2020 was like this too. It couldn’t happen here - it’s just a China problem. And then the country was caught flat-footed and hundreds of thousands of people died unnecessarily.

As a Kiwi, I suspect that our sudden flight to proto-fascist government is part of the response to the overwhelmingly effective NZ pandemic response. To have a strategy that saw death rates go DOWN in a pandemic was so psychologically traumatic, many have taken refuge in atavistic Big Daddy

and 2021 and 2022 and 2023 and 2024. Thousands still dying every month, so many more than that becoming disabled, many of them were young/healthy. Show them all the v solid and expansive med literature/evidence, current local wastewater data, etc... and they still believe it can't happen to them.

It wouldn't have happened here except Trump destroyed America's pandemic response capabilities.

And even after it "happened here" millions didn't believe it was happening! It was some sort of conspiracy, just a flu that was being used as an excuse to "take away our rights."

i remember being at the grocery store checkout holding two apples while everyone else in line was stocking up with full carts. That was the moment i was like "huh. maybe they actually will do the lockdowns"

Love to see the person in the replies to this post completely missing the point and going all "well Covid couldn't have happened in MY America" and then blocking everyone who points this obviousness out to them.