I will leave my forecast on the development of the situation with the coronavirus. I hesitate to name the country, let’s see how things will develop.
The official number of cases will decline sooner than the actual number. Because it’s not working out, and you can’t shut down the economy for so long because then people will start dying of hunger and cold (at some point you will need to invent a story “why we opened the business”. And this story has to be convincing. If it “doesn’t work”, then it will be chaos, and people will come out with pitchforks. But if the story isn’t launched and the business is kept closed too long, people will come out with pitchforks anyway. Yet with the story, there’s at least a chance that a miracle happens, and everything somehow fixes itself)
Therefore, the informal strategy chosen will be “show a decline, even if there isn’t one”. If the gap between real and official numbers fails to close for a long time, the consequences for the country will be catastrophic regardless of whether you deceived the population or not. But if it quickly zeroes out, then “winners aren’t judged”.
Moreover, there will be few viable ways to prove the discrepancy, and those who try will be labeled as fake news spreaders causing panic, and they will be punished. To reduce the gap, causes of death and diagnoses will begin to be counted very selectively. In the end, the actual number will eventually decline, but later, and some people will die during the pandemic, only part of whom will be recognized as consequences of the virus. Most likely, high mortality will be explained by the presence of chronic diseases in the population, caught decades ago. The risk of infection will be associated with the population not following recommendations.
Businesses will open, but at the same time, the requirements for making them safer will increase. The requirements will be difficult to meet, but no one will actually expect to achieve 100%. For example, a store in the center of a large city may not be able to control the people queuing outside, if the territory doesn’t belong to it but is common with “neighbors”. Ultimately, businesses will always end up being violators, but since so many will violate, there will be a choice of whom to punish urgently and who might still work a couple more years, so the risk will remain with the “uncooperative” and “disloyal”.
Restrictions (all related to the virus) will be lifted significantly slower than business openings. The decrease in the number of cases will be explained by “self-isolation” and “effective sealing of the country’s borders and its parts”. They will wait for a second wave, justifying the decision that it’s too early to lift restrictions. People will get used to asking for permission to move within the city, between cities, and between countries, and gathering in groups (which will automatically solve the rally issue) will start to be seen as normal. All who disrupt the order will be marked as violators, to have the possibility to quarantine those necessary and those not necessary.
A vaccine won’t be made for at least another year, if ever. Simply because — if herd immunity displaces the virus, a vaccine (at least for the current strain) won’t be needed. Political implications will be woven in: no one wants to later admit that the citizens of country A were saved by country B providing the vaccine. Most likely, when a vaccine is made, its “recipe” will be public, but there won’t be money left in the economy to produce the required number of vaccines.
But I think that over time, a cheap antibody test will be developed, and employees with a “I’ve recovered” certificate will be valued higher than those without one. Informally, but still this point will be taken into account. It’s better to put someone on the checkout who won’t kick the bucket a week later due to a “workplace injury”.
Most likely, there will be difficulties with immigration and tourism. When flights resume, testing will be among the actions required before departure (and the cost will be borne by the passenger).
Large industries affected (like airlines, etc.) will become more state-driven. Small companies will be bought out by major players, likely just for real estate and brand. Salaries in some sectors will drop, and the labor market will shift to favor employers.
These are my thoughts. I hope I am wrong. I will check in about six months.
Hi, I'm Rauf Aliev. 