A leading South Korean doctor says Trump's 'pride' and 'ego' are putting the world's health at risk

In an interview with Wired this week, Min Pok-kee, whose aggressive approach in the city of Daegu became a model for South Korea's nationwide response, said Trump's failure meant that "it's inevitable that you become like Italy." The president's failure to provide widespread testing was because of his pride and ego. 

South Korea's focus on mass testing has helped it "flatten the curve" and take control of the spread of the virus. As of Friday morning, it had 9,332 confirmed coronavirus cases and 139 deaths. Min said social distancing should be "instituted comprehensively" in the US to avoid the national crisis seen in Italy.

"How are existing facilities in the US going to handle all the infected patients? They can't," he told Wired. "So then it's inevitable that you become like Italy. Korea also could have become like Italy, but we assessed the situation very quickly."