I wrote this 2 months ago to caution people who were drawing the conclusion that Eastern Europe had escaped the brunt of the pandemic due to better politicians than Western Europe - and made the suggestion that Eastern Europe is still likely to get hit hard down the road... https://twitter.com/Care2much18/status/1271809992149078016

At the time, people were correctly noting that the wealthy countries in Europe were suffering far more deaths than the poorest countries in Eastern Europe.

That still remains the case when you analyze deaths per million.

For now.

The conclusions people were drawing were sketchy.

Essentially the argument was "Eastern European politicians locked down quickly, while Western European politicians delayed".

That argument never made much sense to begin with - on the basis it wasn't even true.

10 poorest countries in Europe:

Deaths past 14-days:

Romania - 525
Ukraine - 286
Kosovo - 145
Bosnia - 130
Bulgaria - 109
Moldova - 96
Serbia - 83
Albania - 76
N. Macedonia - 43
Montenegro - 23

Total: 1,516

10 wealthiest countries in Europe:

Deaths past 14-days:

Germany - 63
Sweden - 40
Netherlands - 19
Ireland - 12 (8 historical, 4 new)
Switzerland - 10
Luxembourg - 8
Austria - 7
Denmark - 6
Norway - 6
Iceland - 0

Total: 171

Total population of 10 poorest: 91 million
Total population of 10 wealthiest: 146 million

Deaths per million, last 14 days:

Poorest: 16.7
Wealthiest: 1.1

Historically, what we saw in previous pandemics is this:

Western Europe gets hit hard, first, and carries the mortality load.

Eastern Europe escapes early, before getting hit hard 12-16 weeks after.

There were reasons to suspect this may happen again - and it has.

Deaths per million, June 15th:

Ireland - 345
Moldova - 99
N. Macedonia - 86
Romania - 72
Bosnia - 50

Deaths per million, August 15th:

Ireland - 359
N. Macedonia - 257
Moldova - 219
Romania - 151
Bosnia - 143

Now, if Covid19 does prove seasonal, what we would expect to see is Ireland getting hit hard again in late November, with the likes of Romania getting hit hard early February.

That's assuming of course we don't mount a whole-of-society effort to prevent that - which we will :)

I suppose the point:

Victory parades after 2 months were farcical. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

So were the "Ireland is doing 4 times worse than Moldova" tweets.

It's less than 2 times worse now, today.

In 2 months from now at current rates of death? Far "better".

Being located in Western Europe was always going to be a massive disadvantage early.

Being a poor country with no resources to sustain a response, relying on donated tests/medical supplies (like Moldova), was always going to be a massive disadvantage as the pandemic progressed.

Touch wood, Ireland will maintain this low death rate through the winter.

If we can, we owe it to our friends in Romania and other places to help them in any way we can.

It should never have been "better vs worse".

It should always have been "lets all help each other".