But lockdowns that helped to subdue Covid-19 in advanced countries have proved less affordable or effective in emerging economies. Here, social distancing is hard to sustain. In countries with large informal economies, those who cannot work may starve.
CONVENTIONAL wisdom has it that the Covid-19 pandemic started to spread from Wuhan, China.
From there, it went global – hitting the United States in January 2020. China started to end its lock-down in February. Since then, other locked-down economies have begun reopening, even though the global pandemic is accelerating. Until there is a treatment or vaccine, the world must learn to live with the virus (and the 5% death rate that follows). Cumulative global confirmed cases are already past 10 million, a quarter of them in the US alone. Daily new cases hit records of more than 180,000 towards end-June.
Limited time offer:
Just RM5 per month.
