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Very interesting.

I suspect that the difference is culture.

As of today, South Korea has had 10,804 cases with 254 deaths for a death rate of 2.35%. A total of 9,283 or 85.9% of the South Korean cases have recovered, with 1,267 cases remaining active.

Many Asian countries take very seriously the threat of infectious disease, since they still actively remember SARS. I think that South Koreans immediately started practicing social distancing and wearing face masks when the news first hit about the new virus in China. I also think that they managed to keep the virus out of nursing homes, so their most vulnerable people were never exposed. In addition, the rate of obesity in South Korea is low, which is probably another factor in how they kept the death rate so low (obesity is one of the conditions that increases severity of Covid-19). Note that much of this is conjecture based on my knowledge of Asian cultures; I would love to see expert analyses of how South Korea handled the pandemic.

New York City, OTOH, is run by Democrats, who are experts at getting elected by appealing to emotions without having any real qualifications for performing the job of an elected official. (AOC is a prime example of that!) So when the crisis hit, NYC did not have anyone competent to make the right decisions. There is also the American culture of “me first” which is all too prevalent, especially among the young. Their attitude is, “Why should I have to be forced into social distancing when it’s only old people that are dying (and the faster they die off, the better)?” So, the spoiled brat culture is a factor in the spread of virus in highly Democrat places.