From politically connected individuals raiding the state coffers for PPE kick-backs, to ministers removing cooked chickens from the shelves, lockdown in South Africa has been a perplexing ordeal. Many government measures have saved lives – but others have left citizens scratching their heads.
Three alcohol bans, five months of tobacco prohibition, a government-regulated list of what clothes you’re can buy during Level 4 – and even an attempt to ‘have everyone in bed’ by 21:00 on New Year’s Eve. Lockdown has been tough on millions of South Africans: So it may come as no surprise to see where our nation appears on the ‘COVID resilience’ scale.
The Bloomberg-created project assesses 11 variables across two different table contents: COVID Status, and Quality of Life. South Africa doesn’t do too badly in terms of containing the virus – but issues such as ‘lockdown severity’ and ‘GDP growth forecasts’ hold South Africa back significantly. Our current ‘access to vaccines’ is also a debilitating factor.
SA’s case and mortality rates remain relatively low, however – and that’s arguably the only thing keeping us off the bottom of this 53-country list. Mexico takes the wooden spoon here, largely thanks to its average number of fatalities and ‘high test positivity’ results. Registering 30.8 on the 100-point scale, the Hispanic Territory is comfortably worse-off than South Africa.
Every cloud, and all that. You can see the visuals of that table here:
And, if you’re wondering where the best places to be during the pandemic are, we’ve got the results here. You get no prizes for guessing who comes top, by the way.
RANK | ECONOMY | BLOOMBERG RESILIENCE SCORE | LOCKDOWN SEVERITY | 2021 GDP GROWTH FORECAST | UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE COVERAGE | HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | New Zealand | 76.8 | 22 | 4.5% | 83 | 0.93 |
2 | Singapore | 71.3 | 50 | 5.5% | 92 | 0.94 |
3 | Australia | 70.9 | 52 | 3.6% | 89 | 0.94 |
4 | Taiwan | 70.1 | 19 | 3.7% | 79 | 0.91 |
5 | China | 66.3 | 78 | 8.3% | 70 | 0.76 |
6 | Norway | 64.5 | 65 | 3.5% | 94 | 0.96 |
7 | Finland | 64.5 | 52 | 2.8% | 91 | 0.94 |
8 | Japan | 63.6 | 53 | 2.6% | 96 | 0.92 |
9 | Hong Kong | 63.5 | 60 | 4.2% | — | 0.95 |
10 | Vietnam | 63 | 56 | 7.6% | 60 | 0.7 |
11 | U.A.E. | 62.3 | 45 | 2.4% | 63 | 0.89 |
12 | South Korea | 60.9 | 64 | 3.2% | 89 | 0.92 |
13 | Canada | 60.9 | 75 | 4.4% | 90 | 0.93 |
14 | Thailand | 59.4 | 58 | 3.9% | 72 | 0.78 |
15 | Israel | 56.8 | 85 | 4.8% | 81 | 0.92 |