Economic crisis caused by virus highly synchronised

Virus challenge: Health workers carry out Covid-19 tests in Bogota. Colombia, the fourth-largest economy in Latin America, has surpassed the 100,000 infection mark, prompting economist Ocampo to state that recovery would be a long process. — AFP

SANTIAGO: The economic crisis caused by the novel coronavirus pandemic is the “most synchronised” in history and its prospects of recovery is quite uncertain, Colombian economist Jose Antonio Ocampo said on Saturday during a virtual conference.

“It is much faster than the Great Depression of the 1930s, but we hope it will not be as long as the Great Depression, ” said Ocampo, a former executive secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC).