This is the problem of authoritarian hierarchical systems; bad news will be suppressed internally out of fear of upsetting higher-ups, making responses too slow even when there are things like the Contagious Disease National Direct Reporting System: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/29/world/asia/coronavirus-china.html …
Two choices have been presented: Authoritarian systems where feedback is mitigated by ass covering vs Democratic systems where action is thwarted by utter madness ("quarantines are badthink") and by massive division where no one trusts any information sources The former wins