Covid-19 creating chaos on many fronts

WITH the global death toll now more than 360,000 and still rising, the Covid-19 pandemic is creating health, ethical, social, business, economic and political chaos.

Health crisis

As of today, there have been 5.8 million confirmed cases of Covid-19, including 360,000 deaths.

Although coronaviruses mostly affect the respiratory system, they can also damage the heart, liver, or kidneys and affect the blood and immune system.

The World Health Organisation reported that most people infected with the Covid-19 virus will experience mild to moderate respiratory illness and recover without requiring special treatment. 

However, older people, and those with underlying medical problems like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease and cancer are more likely to develop serious illness. Once patients develop severe complications heart, renal, or multiple organ failure, this will result in death.

As hospitals are filling up with sick and dying patients, front-line healthcare workers, often without adequate protective gear and forced to work exhausting long hours, often in overcrowded and under-resourced settings and having to deal with the fear of exposing themselves or their families to the virus are also being confronted with health issues.

Additionally, with prolonged lockdowns, businesses worry about their sustainability and employees about their job prospects.

All these may ultimately result in patients and victims of Covid-19 and their families, front-liners, businesses, workers and some of the public being confronted by not only health but also mental health issues

Ethical crisis

As Covid-19 cases and death surge, hospitals are confronting severe scarcity of vital medical resources including PPE, intensive care units (ICUs) beds and ventilators, bringing into tension two important forms of medical ethics: public health ethics and clinical ethics.

This has resulted in the urgent need for healthcare organisations and teams to make challenging and emotionally wrought decisions on who to be offered medical treatment and who to be denied it.

The global communities were aghast of the decisions of countries deciding not to offer medical help to the elderly and disabled patients, leaving many to die.

Business disruption

The pandemic has severely impacted on industries. Governments have responded to Covid-19 by shutting down many businesses which crippled nearly all but essential businesses/business concerns.

Travel restrictions and the closing of borders by nations to prevent influx of tourists have resulted in the airlines, tourism and hospitality sector emerging as the hardest-hit sectors.

Initial International Labour Organisation (ILO) estimates point to a significant rise in unemployment and underemployment in the wake of the virus.

Based on different scenarios for the impact of Covid-19 on global GDP growth, preliminary ILO estimates indicate a rise in global unemployment of between 5.3 million (“low” scenario) and 24.7 million (“high” scenario) from a base level of 188 million in 2019.

The “mid” scenario suggests an increase of 13 million (7.4 million in high-income countries).  

Disruptions in business and rising unemployment have sparked social unrest in many parts of the world. In short, the pandemic is destroying lives and livelihoods around the world.

Economic chaos & global recession

The World Economic Forum (WEF) dovetailed that the measures necessary to contain the virus are bringing economies to a screeching halt.

BBC News dated April 3, headlined Coronavirus: A visual guide to the economic impact, reported that global shares plunged with the FTSE, Dow Jones Industrial Average and the Nikkei experiencing huge falls since the outbreak began on December 31.

The WEF dated March 6, headlined The economic, geopolitical and health consequences of Covid-19  spotlighted that the 2003 SARS outbreak, which infected about 8,000 people and killed 774, cost the global economy an estimated US$50 billion.

The 2015 MERS outbreak in South Korea, meanwhile, infected 200 people and killed 38, but led to estimated costs of US$8.5 billion. Already the coronavirus epidemic has had a greater economic effect than either of these predecessors.

Wall Street has joined a global sell-off, the S&P 500 index of US companies fell by 11.5% the week commencing on February 24, the worst week since the 2008 crisis.

Thus, a global recession is now inevitable. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) warns that the economic havoc caused by the coronavirus pandemic could spark further social unrest around the globe and urged governments to take steps to prevent the disturbances.

Changing political landscape

The outbreak of Covid-19 has raised significant questions on governments’ ability to deal with a pandemic.  

As a case in point Brookings dated March 31, headlined France at war with the coronavirus: politics under anaesthesia?, spotlighted that the health crisis that has engulfed our societies, including France, appears to be turning politics-as-usual upside down, rendering the need for democratic consultation moot, at least for now.

The political battlefield has shifted towards public health policy, crisis management, and executive leadership. Peacetime politics have been replaced by angry debate on how to conduct the war against Covid-19, with initial concerns of what approach and duration is necessary.

Lockdown

Following from the serous impact of this pandemic, more than 100 countries have instituted lockdowns in varying degrees of restrictions.

Lifting of lockdown

After undergoing several weeks and months of the lockdown, many countries, primarily due to severe business disruptions and economic crisis, have now started to lift restriction of lockdown to allow businesses to open and citizens more freedom of movement  and this has raised the concern of the public fearing that a second wave of Covid-19 would be deadlier.

6 conditions to be fulfilled before lifting restrictions and lockdown

Recognising the dichotomy between mitigating medical crisis and economic recession, director-general of WHO Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has warned that premature attempts to restart economies could trigger secondary peaks in Covid-19 cases, advocating that the process be deliberate and widely coordinated.

WHO has dovetailed that any government that wants to start lifting restrictions must first meet six conditions:

1. Disease transmission is under control;

2. Health systems are able to “detect, test, isolate and treat every case and trace every contact”;

3. Hot spot risks are minimised in vulnerable places, such as nursing homes;

4. Schools, workplaces and other essential places have established preventive measures;

5. The risk of importing new cases “can be managed”; and,

6. Communities are fully educated, engaged and empowered to live under a new normal.

Thus, political chaos is now shifted from angry debate on how to conduct the war against Covid-19, with initial concerns of what approach and duration of measures are critical to prevent or slow down the pandemic to strong opposition to the government lifting the lockdown prematurely. – May 29, 2020.

* Sheriffah Noor Khamseah Al-Idid Dato Syed Ahmad Idid is an innovation & nuclear advocate.
 

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight.