The following essay was originally published in French as “La Grèce et la pandémie: Quelques réflexions,” in Revue Politique, June 30, 2020, and appears here by permission. Translated by Russell A. Berman.
It is widely recognized that Greece survived the difficult test of COVID-19 well. The international press has been writing about the “little Greek miracle” for more than a month: a country ravaged by the economic crisis of the past years has been able to resist the public health challenge better than many other European countries. And it is right to emphasize this unexpected success as due primarily to the speed of the government’s decisions, the closing of the borders, the strict lockdown of about two months, but also the population’s obedience to special laws issued by the authorities, both in terms of health and politics. Every evening at 6:00 PM, the epidemiologist Professor Sotirios Tsiodras spoke to the public directly on television about the measures taken and the track of the pandemic, in a calm, humane, and confident tone, showing appropriate emotions when he spoke of the deaths, turning into the family doctor, a personality familiar to everyone.
