June 3rd 2020

By Thomas Klikauer and Nadine Campbell

At the complete opposite of the three right-wing populist leaders stand three women who, as prime ministers, did markedly better. First, there is the most powerful female prime minister today, Germany's Angela Merkel. By the 2nd of June, Germany's coronavirus death count stood at 8,600. Having a much smaller population – 4.9 million compared to Germany's 83 million – the world's most admired prime minister is New Zealand's Jacinda Ardern. Ardern has overseen just twenty-two deaths. Even better did Taiwan’s prime minister Tsai Ing-wen with only seven deaths out of a population of 24 million. In other words, three female prime ministers together reported 8,629 Coronavirus deaths – just 5% of those clocked up by the three right-wing populists.

To place this further into perspective, the number of deaths is different in countries with a high population compared to those with a lower one. The USA, with a total population of 330 million, compares differently to New Zealand's 4.9 million, for example. To compensate for this, health statisticians operate with "death/1M pop" – deaths per one million of a given population. It relates the actual number of coronavirus casualties to the number of people in a country. In other words, it measures how many people in a country have lost their lives in relation to the overall population. Here are the numbers for our three right-wing populists and the three countries run by three women.

Boris Johnson's UK lost 575 people per one million of his population, Donald Trump's USA 323, and Brazil 141. By comparison, the three women lost 103 (Germany), 4 (New Zealand), and 0.3 (Taiwan). In other words, on average, our three right-wing populists lost 350 people (346.34) per one million of their population. By comparison, the three women lost just 35 people out of one million on average.

But what do all these numbers tell us? They tell us that you are better off living in a country that is run by a female leader than a male right-wing populist. It tells you that you are ten times more likely to survive the coronavirus in Germany, New Zealand, and Taiwan compared to the USA, the UK, and Brazil. Put it the other way around; you are ten times more likely to die of the coronavirus in a country run by a right-wing populist. On the downside, setting female prime ministers against right-wing populists may illuminate a lot, but it is by no means the only factor that creates a high or low survival rate.

Call it female intuition or clear thinking, what Germany's, New Zealand's and Taiwan's prime ministers have in common, and is working in their advantage, are four things. First of all, they are not Stupid White Men; secondly, they are not right-wing populists; thirdly, they did not belittle the coronavirus; and fourthly, the three women did not muck about then the coronavirus appeared. They did not waste valuable time to intervene. Science supports this when emphasizing, what is clear to us is that early and strong interventions do save lives.

 Instead, these women got their countries prepared by locating and isolating people with the coronavirus and establishing a testing regime. They also didn't follow the neoliberal catechism of favoring Profit over People, as Chomsky once said with his usual accuracy. In the end, the lesson is clear. When you support a right-wing populist, you are ten times more likely to die. In other words, vote for a female prime minister, and you will live. Vote for a right-wing populist, and you will die. Some people might keep this in mind when going to the November election in the USA.

German born Thomas Klikauer was educated at Boston University and American born Nadine Campbell was educated at Berkeley. Both live in Sydney and teach at Western Sydney University’s Sydney Graduate School of Management.

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