Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-hwa asserts that it wasn't just MERS that prepared Korea for COVID19, but also the Sewol Ferry. "The government's response to the ferry incident was ineffectual, and that became a national trauma." http://www.ohmynews.com/NWS_Web/View/at_pg.aspx?CNTN_CD=A0002632754

I think she has a point here - we're seeing right now the kind of large-scale, widely-felt anguish that people are going through in several countries as they helplessly watch their governments respond too late or too little. It leaves a mark.

Not to argue that a single news magazine front cover should be used as an indicator of the pain of that time, but... I'll never forget this front cover from the Sewol ferry reporting. The headline reads "Is this a country"