 Welcome back to Think Tech here on a given Monday morning. It's Global Connections and we have Professor Ta-Yong Baik. He is professor at the William S. Richardson School of Law. Good morning, Ta-Yong. How are you? Good morning, Jay. Good to see you again. How are you? I'm doing good. I'm still healthy. Knock wood, you know. So before we get to the subject in chief, which is the Korea experience on coronavirus, I wanted to ask you about this conference you were involved in last week for I guess most or all of last week using Skype. Can you talk about how that worked and who was there and how they handled it? Yeah, as you know, I'm a member of a UN working group on enforced or involuntary disappearances and this working group is composed of five people who represent five different regions of the world. We were supposed to have a session in Costa Rica at this time, but because of this COVID-19 situation, we could not conduct the actual session. So we decided to have a little bit of a modified remote session through Skype for business. And along with those five members, we have a secretary who are working in Geneva and they are also working from home. So all five secretary members assisting us also through this Skype and it was kind of amazing experience. Initially, we did not think it would be so effective, but everybody followed all of the modified work procedure, preparing all of the memorandum in advance or talking point prepared shared in advance. So even if we had a two hour meeting per day for a week, we have done quite a significant work including a review of more than 500 cases from 26 countries and also discussion on various aspects of enforced disappearances. Unfortunately, it's continuing even at this time. Sometimes in some country because of this COVID-19 it is getting worse. Yeah, just for a moment, let me ask you, where is it getting worse? Who are the principal offenders these days in terms of countries in which mysterious disappearances take place? Yeah, enforced disappearances is basically abduction or some other form of deprivation of liberty of people by the government or governmental entity. So those countries who are, you know, blamed for this enforced disappearances are everywhere, currently under our system, more than 100 countries have enforced disappearances cases. And many of those cases are involved with the domestic conflict or internal security act or sometimes transnational abduction is also happening. And because of this COVID-19 situation, security forces are given more power than usual. So mentioned specific country at this time, but apparently in some usual, usually blamed for country are using this for additional kind of arrest and conducting this bad criminal activities. To our viewers for a moment, Taeyong and I had a show about this. It must be about a year ago, I think, where we discussed his work for the United Nations in this area. So if you want to know more, take a look at ThinkTech and look us up. Taeyong bike, B-A-I-K bike. So Taeyong, the principal discussion this morning is about Korea and COVID. When Korea has done a remarkable job and my just my cursory reading on it suggests that one of the reasons is that it has a growing biotech industry which was able to generate the tests and the other is that people cooperated with the testing and the tracking, even if it meant giving up some of their privacy. And as a result, you were able, South Korea was able to stamp out COVID pretty quickly. Can you talk about what happened? Actually, as you said, South Korea had been stricken hardly at the first stage of this COVID-19 virus spread. And I was kind of shocked that most countries were blocking South Korean travelers in around two or three months ago because of the rapid spreading of virus in Korea after China. However, currently South Korea is successfully containing the COVID-19 virus. And it is, I think, because of the approach that South Korea had taken. In my opinion, there are two different ways of fighting against this COVID-19. One is to focus on the infection or infect the people who are infected or exposed. And another approach probably would be a prevention focused approach. And South Korea had taken the most seriously about the testing and contact tracing of those infected people or people who are exposed to the virus. And they shared the information in a very transparent manner. And they continued the isolation, self-isolation, or even according to their law, the current time, which are mandatory if they are found to be a patient. And under Korean law that they adopted after 2015 experience of Mary's, so-called Middle East respiratory syndrome. There was an outbreak of Mary's then, and I think 38 people died as a result, yeah. Exactly. And at the time, South Korea learned a lesson in a very hard way because they didn't know this kind of immediate response of checking and tracing is so crucial. It started with only one businessman, but it had spread out so rapidly as South Korea could not control it in a very short period of time. So it took around 17,000 testing within two months for them to end it. So after that experience, they decided to give the Korean CDC more power to do more aggressive, take more aggressive measures in terms of tracing people, whereas a person is found to be infected or contracted. They can look at some of their personal information, which is given according to the law that they legislated at the time. This actually turns out to be a lucky break. But now you're involved in human rights. Your whole life is a study of human rights and civil rights and privacy. How do you feel about, you know, individuals giving up their privacy and allowing the government to get and use all their personal information? Like for example, my understanding is that the way the government works is it is able to get your cell phone GPS location. It is able to get your credit card records and essentially know where you have been and what you have done. And now it uses that for tracking. But what about the civil rights aspect of it? That's a very important question. And as you know, I'm very, you know, very much concerned about those infringement of fundamental human rights or constitutional rights. So under the South Korean Constitution Article 372, there are several exceptions when fundamental rights can be infringed. And one is national security concern, and another is public health concerns. It is not only in South Korean law, but also in the U.S. law and even UN, ICS, Civil and Political Rights Convention also allows that exception. So as long as those exceptions are used in a very cautious way, fully protecting other rights, it is not against the legal system. And in South Korea, in 2015, they changed, amended their law so that they can confirm their constitutional provision. And the way how South Korean KCDC and also municipal government is tracing the possible spreading or transmission of disease is also still very much concerned, I mean, following this standard. Of course, if it is abused, and if it is used in one way or another for other purposes, it will be very disastrous. However, in Korea, fortunately, we have seen kind of tremendous democratization process and people's trust to those administration who are leading this fight is also very important part. And people really relying on the information transmitted by the government through SNS message or television network or other alerts, they did try to social distancing on their own, not being imposed by any legal measure. Which is, I think, a very important point because South Korea had seen a lot of military dictatorship or governmental intervention of people's ordinary life, and they, I think, could not accept the lockdown if it was a rapidly imposed over all businesses. People in South Korea would have been really angry about that. But if they are focusing on those infected people, and if they want to share the information only to protect the society as a whole, people are ready to and is accepted because of their 2015 experience. Coming back to this situation, can I just add one more word? In the US, we also have a legal system under our constitution and also communicative disease related federal law and state law allows us to take reasonable measure if it is compelling governmental interest involved. And also in some areas it is reasonable kind of measure to take. So, however, we chose more focusing on general prevention rather than specific kind of testing and tracing. So I'm not sure whether we had taken the best strategies at the first stage. Let me drill down on that for a minute. So you're saying that legally in the United States, they could do the same thing as Korea did. They could get phone records, they could get credit card records because it's a national health emergency. But the government here has not done that. There could be a little bit of a youngster difference, I should say. Under current South Korean infectious disease control act, those KCDC may access to those mobile phone information if a person is found infected without getting warrants from the court. So it is a kind of huge, aggressive measure that allowed. I don't think in the United States there is any specific law that gave the power that we can do collect information without arrest warrant. But as I said, it is an exceptional situation. And if there is a ground for exception, we can do that. And my opinion, lock down, locking down business is something similar. And it is not impossible in the US legal system. Yeah, clearly. So one very interesting sort of oblique on this is that about a month ago, Google and Apple announced they were collaborating on a tracking system, which was based on the GPS of the of the telephones the smartphones. They worked on it for a month and then they came up with an app, but the government, my understanding but the government said no because the government felt that this was intrusive. And it was the government was not going to participate in it so, at least at this point in time, the app is not functioning. It's not that regrettable, because Google and Google and Apple certainly could have did do an app that would have used this kind of GPS information to great benefit in the United States but we don't have the benefit of that. Even in South Korea, to request to use those mobile phone app to trace individual's isolation status or others are not requested or done by the law. In many cases, they are financially kind of basis. So when you arrive or arrive or arrive, newly arrived people arrives in South Korea in the airport from foreign country. They then they request to allow to install the app so that they can frequently trace their body temperature and also report it back so that once they see some symptom. They immediately get tested. So, even in the United States, I think some some measure could have been taken but we should acknowledge that it is a huge work because once you get the data, there should be people who are working on those data and tracking those people who are tracing them. In South Korea, all kind of governmental administrative bodies, including municipal bodies and law enforcement agents work together to trace those information to share it with the public. So recently in Itaewon, there is one person who visited several nightclub and now two weeks had passed and they had successfully contained in by now but to do that they tested 16,000 kind of people who were around the area and those information actually were broadcasted publicly that these nightclubs were the impacted places and people who visited there should do voluntary check and the government waive that the identity kind of disclosing the requirement so everybody can go to check anonymously. So it is a really kind of approaches that different approaches that they are taking sharing information in a transparent measure, allowing people more tools to, you know, avoid any further spreading and transmission which is I think very important point for us to think about. How much is that is derived from the experience that South Korea had in 2015 with the MERS virus and how much you think is sort of culturally resonant where people decide that something is important so they work together and they collaborate between governments, individuals, institutions as you have seen here recently in Korea. It depends on the definition of culture but I would not say it is because of Korean culture rather it was a very hard-learned Korean experience based upon MERS and also as you may remember the tragedy of some confetti where 400 young students were actually drowned to death because of the lack of governmental immediate focused measures and also another background is that South Korea is a heavily net of the society. Everybody has access to internet and mobile phone is everywhere and people are very highly educated and they are kind of a custom to respond to social agenda if it is properly directed and it is shared in a transparent manner and they are ready to kind of cooperate with leadership if the measure is getting some consensus of the people and South Korean government had been somewhat successful in persuading all of the society that this is a necessary measure and people had to cooperate. So I would not say this is because of South Korean specific culture rather it is a combination of everything and in Hawaii we also have a high internet and very good networks and other very well trained and educated people so I think we can also do it. Yeah well we should be proud but also the South Korea should be proud you should be proud. Yeah I am actually yeah but I'm still not too much optimistic because three days later they will start to open the high school and gradually middle school and elementary schools and they are already kind of starting to loosen a little bit and I hope they will see another big outbreak so it should be still a matter that everybody should approach in a very cautious way. I'm sure everybody is watching it very carefully but let me talk to you more about the mechanics. So who get under the system in South Korea as it has evolved over the past couple of months who gets tested what are the parameters of the criteria for testing. That's an important question in fact at the first stage those testing kit was not as well advanced as we see at this time and it was not so much abundant at the time so they were more focused on those infected or those who had been exposed to those infected people. And gradually they expanded it toward the more people surrounding that infected or exposed people and later they also found developed a more rapid testing kit so initially it took several days but later on it took 15 minutes now 10 minutes and with a drive through testing. They are now allowing virtually everybody if they have some reason for them to test and of course if they found to be patient infected they do not charge any and if there's no ground for them to test but if they wanted to test they probably will charge around $120 something. But apparently it's quite different in that everybody feel that they are you know given option to test if there's any reason in the United States especially in Hawaii we had difficulties in early stage because of delayed delivery and 40 kids. And even at this time I'm not sure whether everybody can have the test which if we in the future open up our business and if we want to return back to from this very extreme social distancing. We should find a way to enhance the testing and also tracing we should know where are the cluster located and where you should avoid to go or what kind of additional measure we should take to disinfecting and others so we are still in need of some more information to completely conquer this current situation. In South Korea everybody think that they know where it is going on and of course the privacy information they try to hide as much as possible but sometimes there has been some hatred against some religious group developed or some LGBT community developed. But it is an education process I think so they have a lot to develop other in terms of social kind of you know atmosphere to completely protect those minority groups as well. So it's really remarkable how successful the testing has been and I recall reading that originally at the very outset. Korea had South Korea had some trouble with the testing I think I think they were following the CDC the American CDC testing and that and that was not helping them so they developed their own because they have a strong biochemical research industry and South Korea but here's the thing so now you find in the process of this testing that somebody test positive. Okay now we want to bring all those analytical what analytical tools together. Use all the technology that we can do and you know as you said Korea is advanced in the Internet advanced and information technology. So you know like for example in the case of that nightclub it was it was it was revealed it was revealed. So how do you how do you use this information in order to in order to limit any further infection. What's what's the tracking technique and what affirmative steps in South Korea take in order in order to you know suppress any further infection. So, in the case of a terrible nightclub situation. They try to identify as much as much as possible who were directly in the nightclub and who were possibly contracted to the virus by tracing credit card information if the person paid the nightclub entry fee with credit card. Then they can get at least the information that the person was there. And also they did try to use a CCTV so that they can identify the person who are there and also they use mobile phone location GPS information so that they can blast the mess alert email. So there has been this break outbreak of this huge new COVID-19 patients. Since you we think you could have been in the nightclub or around the area, try to identify whether you have any symptoms and if you fear you have symptoms go to nearby health services that can test for free and even anonymously. So, by using those information to kind of a shared I mean to to let people know to decide what to do. Those were wanting one important measure that they have taken and additionally was a person is found impacted. They did try to identify the places that the person had visited or the people the person had met by interviews on interviews and those information again had been shared with relevant companies or private school institutions and others. So for that one person's case started with one person they tested 16,000 people with this two week period. It's amazing. But by doing that now they have only 16 case daily again and eight of them is related to this nightclub. So they are successful in terms of containing it because of this tracing and sharing information and also if they had been contracted even if they do not have a symptom, they generally try to do self isolation not quarantine because they are not still infected. And if they develop your symptom and find positive, you know tested positive then they are sent to hospital immediately. So it is also a combination of tracing and treatment and also kind of isolation and quarantine process all combined. So it is on the one hand governmental leadership but on the other end I think the people it's the voluntary participation based upon full information. I think that is something remarkable we now see. And diagnosis diagnosis of course is a starting point so again we can emphasize here in Hawaii and the United States diagnosis and tracing should be something that we should consider more seriously at this time. I sure like the idea of taking it if you find somebody infected sending him to the hospital right away and treating him to the extent you can. But one thing you know that's been missing in the United States and I wonder if it's also something that would help in Korea or maybe Korea is already doing it is multiple testing. In other words, you test once and you don't know for sure because maybe it's too early in the course of the disease, the infection, or that the person you tested is actually exposed the next day. And, you know, a few days later if you test him a few days later you'll find that maybe is infected and how do you deal with that problem. Is there secondary testing going on, has it helped would it help. Yes, of course. So for those who are exposed but still not infected. They are under the self isolation stage. So initially they may have a test negative but after several days if they develop symptoms, they will test again, and it will probably if the person is found to be positive. The person probably will be taken to the hospital. And if a person is infected and hospitalized during those hospitalization process of two or three weeks, they test multiple times, and only when they found the negative then they are kind of allowed to release from the hospitalization. And furthermore, these days we have reports that after release because they are now negative. Again, some positive research are coming out but today I saw from South Korean newspaper that they do not, they found that those people are not infecting any further. It was a kind of a remaining virus that does not have that power to transmit further. So this abundance opportunity to test is a really important part. Yeah, well, we have we have issues in the United States, you know the story in Michigan, where people are opposing this or the anti vax approach, and we don't believe in testing we don't believe in science and all. That's very troublesome so what what happened in Korea is not likely to happen in the same way in the United States. That's the same time time. Korea had been willing to share its lessons, it has been transparent it has been very altruistic in in teaching and showing other countries how to do this. I wonder what your thoughts are about whether the United States could learn and what specifically could it should it learn from Korea, and whether it will learn from Korea, and whether maybe it's too late to learn from Korea. I, first of all, I would like to point out that the United States had already learned a lot. Last, you know, couple of months, you know, not only by South Korea but also by other successful countries who contained this coffee. But it is one important thing that we can learn from South Korea is the importance of the development of testing testing kid. So, related to that is probably the measure to medicine or other measures to treat those impacted, and also the development of vaccines in South Korea. I mentioned that the infectious disease control act allows those KBC and other doctors to use those specimen to further develop vaccines or treatment medicine or other measures. They have some legal system that is sponsored by that sponsored this kind of a continuous medical development. And that is how they could come up with a very advanced testing kid in a such a short period of time, and also that's why they are kind of prospecting the vaccine can be developed within several months. And the United States had also loosened a little bit of that procedure and we are trying our best to rapidly developing the vaccines, but it is not something that happened without effort. So the United States, we should also think whether we are taking the best kind of measure approaches and measures to fight this fight against this COVID-19 situation. If there is anything, any one small thing that we can do further, we should do it. And this kind of a crisis and really needs our prompt response, rather than a little bit of a delays and kind of waiting wait and see. Yeah, especially now when we're going back, going back to businesses, going back to schools, going back to restaurants. The system that Korea has devised so successfully is really critical now and we have to follow that in as religious a manner as we possibly can. Well, thank you for talking back. It's been really helpful to talk to you. And I really appreciate you coming around to help us understand this global process. Thank you. Thank you very much for having me. And it was always nice to see you. The same here. Take care. Stay well. Bye.