Quote:
Probably the most fundamental difference between the situation of Taiwan and New Zealand was that in Taiwan responsiveness to pandemic diseases and similar threats is embedded in its national institutions. Taiwan established a dedicated CDC in 1990 to combat the threat of communicable diseases. By contrast, the equivalent organisation in New Zealand (the NZ Communicable Disease Centre, a business unit within the Department of Health) was closed in 1992 with its functions transferred to a newly formed Crown Research Institute (ESR) and then contracted back to what became the Ministry of Health. In addition, Taiwan established a National Health Command centre (NHCC) in 2004 following the SARS epidemic. This agency, working in association with the CDC, was dedicated to responding to emerging threats, such as pandemics, and given the power to coordinate work across government departments and draw on additional personnel in an emergency.
In short, they learnt a lot from SARS but we didn't (or maybe because it didn't affect us much we didn't need to since we only had 1 case reported).