The New Zealand Herald is bringing back some of the best premium stories of 2020. Today we look at the Financial Times series which investigates the global response to the coronavirus pandemic and whether the disaster could have been averted.
Inside story: What went wrong in Wuhan and could the world have been spared?
The Financial Times spoke to dozens of medical professionals, government officials and ordinary citizens in Wuhan to find out what really happened in the first weeks of the outbreak.
During the investigation, some of the people approached were threatened by police, who said that the FT had come to the city with "malicious intent". Police harassment of virus victims, their relatives and anyone hoping to speak to them is continuing, raising doubts about whether Xi Jinping's administration is really willing to facilitate the impartial investigation into the pandemic that it has promised the world.
The first days and weeks of the pandemic were crucial. So why was no action taken?
Through a six-month investigation in the city, the FT uncovered the answers.
How coronavirus exposed Europe's weaknesses
For many Europeans the moment coronavirus arrived on their continent was on February 23 when Italian authorities quarantined 10 small towns south-east of Milan. They watched, agog, as the carabinieri cordoned off access, trapping residents inside their infected neighbourhoods.
Few had imagined that the kind of draconian controls imposed by China in Wuhan would be necessary or indeed feasible in a European democracy. The lockdown of Lombardy's "red zone" should have punctured any complacency. And yet it took another two to three weeks for governments across the continent to appreciate the scale of infection in their own countries and take sweeping measures to contain it.
Some countries coped admirably with the first wave — or had the good fortune of minimal exposure to the virus. Others were hampered by poor preparedness, indecisive leadership and discord between central, regional and local governments. Nations squabbled and failed to learn from each other. The EU itself wobbled under the strain.
How New York's missteps let Covid-19 overwhelm the US
The US had seen coronavirus coming as it swept from China through Asia, Europe and Iran in early 2020. "We're prepared and we're doing a great job with it, and it will go away," said Donald Trump, US president, on March 10. A week earlier, New York governor Andrew Cuomo declared: "Excuse our arrogance as New Yorkers . . . [but] we don't even think it's going to be as bad as it was in other countries."
New York City leaders saw the threat but did not act.
Why arguments and rivalries among politicians and power groups allowed disaster to unfold.
Will coronavirus break the UK?
The pandemic has highlighted the uneasy and unequal nature of the UK's devolution settlement. It came as a particular shock to many in England, not least as the other first ministers began holding separate daily TV briefings. To his discomfort, Boris Johnson, the British prime minister, found that he not only had far less control over the UK's levers of power, but also that he was forced to share decision-making with political opponents.
Covid-19 has already driven a greater wedge between the four nations, testing the boundaries of power.
Could it push them even further apart?
How Africa fought the pandemic - and what coronavirus has taught the world
In almost every respect, Africa is at a disadvantage compared with richer continents. Apart from one. Africans know all too much about infectious diseases. While the virus sent Europeans and Americans into panic, many Africans shrugged, "here comes another one."
Inevitably, the virus pierced Africa's hastily erected defences, spreading to almost 40 countries by March 20. But numbers were relatively low and many countries mounted an aggressive effort to snuff out new infections.
Vital lessons of Covid-19 can be learned from African countries' powerful response.
Ten ways coronavirus crisis will shape world in long term
Covid-19 has had an immediate and massive impact. But how will it affect the longer term? That is far harder to tell.
What do we already know, after 10 months of Covid-19? We know that the world was ill-equipped to cope with a pandemic. It has caused about 1.1 million deaths worldwide, mostly among the elderly. Moreover, some countries have suppressed the disease far more successfully than others.
We know that "social distancing", partly spontaneous and partly enforced, has damaged all activities dependent on human proximity, while benefiting ones that help people stay home. This has slashed travel. We know that vast numbers of businesses will emerge heavily burdened by debt and many will fail to emerge at all. Intervention by the fiscal and monetary authorities has been unprecedented in peacetime, especially in countries with internationally accepted currencies.
