From Uncoordinated Patchworks to a Coordinated System: MERS-CoV to COVID-19 in Korea

• Author: Seong Soo Oh,Chan Wang,Yushim Kim
• DOI: 10.1177/0275074020942414
• Published date: 01 August 2020
• Date: 01 August 2020
• Subject Matter: Using COVID-19 to Advance Learning, Management, & Policy OutcomesLessons for Expanding Crisis Management Techniques & Pedagogy

https://doi.org/10.1177/0275074020942414

American Review of Public Administration

2020, Vol. 50(6-7) 736 –742

© The Author(s) 2020

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DOI: 10.1177/0275074020942414

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Lessons for Expanding Crisis Management Techniques & Pedagogy

Amid the trend of increasing confirmed cases of coronavirus

disease 2019 (COVID-19) around the globe, South Korea

has emerged as a model for other countries to emulate

(Normile, 2020). The United States and South Korea con-

firmed their first COVID-19 cases on the same day, January

20, 2020 (Holshue et al., 2020; Shim et al., 2020; World

Health Organization, 2020). Since March 2020, the con-

firmed cases increased slowly and steadily in Korea, but rap-

idly and exponentially in the United States. Furthermore, this

slow increase in Korea has been achieved without locking

down entire cities or taking any other authoritarian measures

(Normile, 2020), whereas the U.S. government was unable

to act during the valuable initial 2 months to prepare for the

widespread outbreak (Wallach & Myers, 2020). In our view,

the primary reason the United States became the epicenter of

this pandemic in March 2020 is its lack of organized and

centralized coordination at the national level to take the nec-

essary early actions.

The global response to COVID-19 has revealed clearly

that the United States is ill-prepared for the pandemic. The

provision of testing kits throughout the country is patchy;

professional clothing, masks, and other equipment are in

serious shortage, and the enforcement of state and local con-

tainment policies is not as rapid or strict as in other coun-

tries. Both the lack of coordinated actions and delayed

actions during the initial period of the COVID-19 outbreak

have been accompanied by unexpected issues, such as state

and local governments acting alone, which has led them to

compete for critical supplies (e.g., “Competition Among

State. . . ,” 2020). Historically, the Federal Emergency

Management Agency (FEMA) has been committed to reduc-

ing coordination conflicts in response to all types of emer-

gencies by developing the National Incident Management

System (NIMS).

Since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the

Pentagon on September 11, 2001, the U.S. Department of

Homeland Security (DHS) has mandated that organizations

involved in emergency operations at the local, state, and

federal level in the United States adopt the NIMS, which is

scalable and flexible, in the sense that it is able to address

small, routine incidents as effectively as large, complex, and

multijurisdictional incidents (McGuire & Silvia, 2010). The

NIMS is also designed to help all levels of government, non-

governmental organizations, private sector, and non-profit

sector work together during an emergency management

cycle, including a response (FEMA, 2017). The NIMS’

essential component, as well as its coordinating structure, is

the Incident Command System (ICS; FEMA, 2017). The

ICS is a structural innovation that has shown strength in

coordinating multiple response organizations in a network;

“The ICS is, therefore, not a pure hierarchy but an effort to

coordinate a network via a hierarchical form of governance”

(Moynihan, 2008, p. 208).

942414ARPXXX10.1177/0275074020942414The American Review of Public AdministrationKim et al.

research-article2020

1Arizona State University, Phoenix, USA

2Hanyang University, Seoul, Korea

Corresponding Author:

Seong Soo Oh, Hanyang University, 222 Wangsimni-ro, Seongdong-gu,

Seoul 04763, Korea.

Email: ohseongsoo@hanyang.ac.kr

From Uncoordinated Patchworks to

a Coordinated System: MERS-CoV to

COVID-19 in Korea

Yushim Kim1, Seong Soo Oh2, and Chan Wang1

Abstract

South Korea has experienced two national public health crises during this decade. The 2015 Middle East respiratory

syndrome-coronavirus (MERS-CoV) response’s failure to address coordination problems or authority conflicts provided an

opportunity to revise its national disease control system before the 2020 coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis. Our

reflection on Korea’s MERS-CoV and COVID-19 responses provides a perspective on public health emergency management.

It is difficult to project the scale of an emerging infectious disease in advance because of its contagious nature and ability to

cross geographic boundaries. In a national epidemic or global pandemic, a centralized coordination effort at the national level

is desirable, rather than fragmented local, city, or regional efforts.

Keywords

public health emergency management, Incident Command System, MERS-CoV, COVID-19