Table 1.

Summary of policy responses to covid-19 and their effect in China, Thailand, and New York State

	China	Thailand	New York State
Use of face masks and physical distancing	Mandatory in public areas with high adherence	Voluntary and high adherence	Partial implementation with large variations across states
Restriction of domestic travel and social gatherings	No state of emergency introduced, but high compliance with stay at home policy	State of emergency declared; high level of compliance with stay at home	Belated state of emergency introduced two weeks after the first cases, resulting in large surge of cases
Restriction of inbound international arrivals	Mandatory test and state quarantine for all travellers	Mandatory state quarantine for all arrivals	US introduced international travel restriction
Test, trace, quarantine	Rigorous implementation and mandatory quarantine of positive cases	Scaled up laboratory capacity, strong capacity on surveillance and rapid responses, and mandatory quarantine	Initial limitation in laboratory capacity, contact tracing not rigorously implemented, self quarantine at home may not prevent spreading
Availability of PPE	Self reliance through local production	Initial shortage but rectified by scaling up local production	Critical shortage, reliance on suppliers from other countries
Treatment and access to care	Access is facilitated by universal health coverage, plus additional budget allocation; no supply side constraints when cases are brought under control	Universal coverage grants full access, plus additional budget allocation, treatment is free for all Thais and non-Thais	Federal government pays doctors and hospitals for the uninsured at Medicare rates but balance billing not allowed; long queues and limited access
Mobilising surge capacity and critical resources	Central government provides substantial resources to support Wuhan responses	Cases are few and within resource capacity of each province	Inadequate federal government support to state’s mitigation efforts
Governance and public communication	Effective whole government approach; daily update and high trust in the population	Whole government responses led by prime minister, effective daily communication builds trust and gains citizen adherence to measures	Conflicting announcements between governor and mayor; generally inconsistent, insufficient, and confused public messaging in US
Effect on transmission	Local transmission contained to less than two digits by March 2020; volume of covid-19 patients did not overwhelm the health system	Local transmission contained to two digits by May 2020; case load did not disrupt health system	Daily cases contained to less than 1000 by June 2020, but the large number of patients disrupts health systems