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| Credit: New Yorker |
COVID-19(SARS-CoV-2 Virus) started as an infection in the district of Wuhan, China, making its way to an epidemic in China to seeping in the major cities of the world as a global pandemic. Will we need another agenda for solutions by world organisations and governments just for addressing the implications of COVID-19 too?
The History
COVID-19 was a shock to the world. Even the most developed and rich countries weren't able to avoid the pandemic from reaching their countries. However, each country figured its way out - South Korea’s rapid testing and human detection being hailed as the epitome of response to the virus, and slowly other countries have started adopting China’s lockdowns. After various experts and sources figured out the timeline of this pandemic, scientists have concluded a singular way for solving the pandemic - the famous curve. The stricter the lockdowns are, the fewer patients straining hospital resources, but the more time till countries can reopen their economies.
Around March, most of the countries that adopted lockdowns saw a reduction in daily Covid 19 infection but had negatively impacted the economies of major countries massively. The International Monetary Fund (IMF), predicts that the pandemic will shrink the GDP per capita of 170 countries, and the world GDP will go into 3% contraction and challenge the economies of the future with the ‘Great Lockdown’ recession.
The Issue
At present, the pandemic has done various things. Coronavirus is active in almost all countries around the globe, reaching infected cases of 5 million and almost 350K death rates. Lockdown is the ‘temporary but major’ solution for most of the countries and what most can do is to impose the
lockdown to lower the number of infected cases in terms of their country’s medical capacity.Yet, after lockdown being imposed by many states in the United States, there have been numerous ‘anti-lockdown’ protests by the citizens just like Sweden’s ‘No Lockdown’ policy by the people and the Government.
Falling into major recessions, the highest ever unemployment rate was recorded and lowest level of global human development. In India, after lockdown being imposed, many people said that ‘hunger will kill us all before Coronavirus does’ as lockdown has impacted the jobs of minimum wage earners and led to higher poverty rates in the country,
So, is health or the economy more important to the country? A major question for many experts, governments and the people itself. Many countries are now looking to reopen their economies, and scientists fear that this could bring another wave of infections in their countries which will diminish the progress made by governments and the global community.
The Aftermath
A second wave of the virus is to be expected - and what countries can do now is try to find that delicate balance between their economies and health of the civilians. But how far is the ‘Day Final’ with zero cases around the globe? This is a question on everyone’s minds, and many doubt if this virus will ever go away - seeing as the race to a vaccine has no end in sight.
The political impact of this will be also huge, and we can already begin to see some effects of this. President Donald Trump has threatened to stop funding of $400 million a year to the World Health Organisation due to their ‘mismanagement of the situation’, impacting its 14% of total funding during a very vulnerable time.
The Conclusion
Most of the experts have predicted a ‘new normal’ for the world. Masks, social distancing and lockdowns might be a part of our daily routine for a long time till the ‘Day Final’. And whilst we may leave the troubles of the state to the government, combatting the virus takes a combined effort by many responsible individuals. It is us who can stop the spread of the virus to our communities, and us who also pose the biggest threat to our futures.
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