Three months ago no one had heard of covid19 – now it dominates the media. With so many conflicting claims about its likely impacts and how easily it is picked up, it is very hard for the regular citizen to isolate what is true, what is exaggerated and what is understated. Some statements, especially early on during the period, left the impression that a coronavirus pandemic could lead to multiple deaths, others that it would be little worse, maybe no worse, that the annual seasonal flu surge. whatever the health impacts, it is definitely causing major disruptions to some industries – forestry, tourism, airlines, cruise ships, international education and so on. the stock market has slumped on fears of the potential consequences for profitability. many fear it could well lead to a recession. Whatever way one looks at it, it is going to be a major factor in 2020.
We are told that its presence in New Zealand is inevitable — that’s understandable – in this day and age of mass international movements of both traded goods and people its going to be hard, probably impossible, to stop the world wide spread of diseases. Even with our high efforts with border control there are regular scares as prohibited plant diseases get through the fence.
We are told the preparatory work to manage the spread is all in hand. But what level of ‘spread’ is it in hand for. The winter surge in flu related hospital admissions regularly leads to media stories of overcrowding in hospital wards. hospitals are reported to be constantly under pressure. How will the system cope if another dump of patients arrives on account of clovid-19? It’s hard not to conclude that the system will be quickly overwhelmed if this thing takes off.
Already we are hearing of what appear to be lapses. A women in San Antonio, Texas, who had previously tested negative twice for the coronavirus was released by the authorities but is now back in quarantine after a subsequent test came back positive. She was a Wuhan evacuee so all the alerts were supposedly on full power.
A hard part however is getting good consistent information. Are masks important? If so what type of mask should one use and how should one use it? At the moment the country (and world for that matter) is more or less out of suitable masks. Whether they add protection or not, people at street level feel they are better than nothing.
Other questions arise all the time, many of them unanswerable. How long will this scare last? When will China recover and come back into markets and trading as normal again. How long will the travel bans last? How much will the various industries currently shut down be affected by this scare? When will a vaccine be ready? Until we know how things are going we will know where we are at. The Reserve Bank may lower the Cash Rate but that will take interest rates from very low to very very low and as I see it have little stimulatory impact of any consequence. Government Ministers understandably try to calm the situation but they cannot answer either. We are living in times of great uncertainty.
When it is all over maybe some longer term questions should be asked. Are we too dependent on the China trade relationship? Certainly hiccups there cause substantial reactions here.
Coronavirus Covid-19 might be a very tiny creature but it is making its influence felt in 2020 no doubt about that.