Since last year, everyone has been learning that the most
valuable thing in life is health. That was a lesson taught by Covid-19. It is a
dangerous illness but it does not have many differences than other diseases.
The only big difference is that an elderly person or a person who is in a
vulnerable group can have a bad experience in the hospital or in the bad case
of dying. In addition, some common things with other sicknesses are headache
sore throat and fever. The statistics worldometer show that until now, there are 1 431 851 totals deaths
and 60 930 571 total confirmed cases. The main point of this article is the
major financial problem caused by this virus.
This illness caused some community issues such as deprivation
of our health or sometimes our life and the lockdown. The first confirmed case
of Coronavirus was detected in China on the 17th of November 2019,
according to “South China Morning Post “, and since then more and more cases
are confirmed every day. Due to this, the government recommended preventive
measures such as, social distancing, wearing a face mask in public, but most
importantly lockdown. Lockdown is a requirement from the governments to stay
home or in a specific location. It is necessary now because this pandemic is
spreading across the world very fast. The first country that had to be in
lockdown was in China. When a government takes this decision, the only things
that remains open are supermarkets. Considering everything being out of
business, lockdown caused significant problems that should be solved
immediately. These problems are psychological, political but primarily financial.
Financial problems before this virus were really different.
In the beginning of 2019, the economy was in a good place. After this virus
appeared in the world, it was a major financial shock worldwide. A lot of
countries, have adopting budgetary, liquidity and police measures to improve
the health system and to help people who should stay home because they belong in
vulnerable groups. According to the macroeconomist, business teacher Kamiar
Mohaddes, “On the supply side, infections reduce labour supply and productivity,
while lockdowns and business closures also cause supply disruptions. On the
demand side, layoffs and the loss of income and worsened economic prospects
reduce household consumption and firms’ investment.”
Specifically,
the lockdown cutbacks put into place for England have had a remarkable
influence on small businesses. Research advocates that 234,000 have already
stopped trading and one in five small businesses don’t think they would pull
through another lockdown. According to ‘’Simply Business, in 2020’’ 85 per cent
of small business owners intend to remain self-employed and 10 per cent are
planning to start a new business. To exemplify, since Leicester had been in
Lockdown for a full year, there has been a huge impact on small businesses.
There was actually a survey made by ‘’Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) in 2020’’ to explore the impact
of coronavirus on small businesses and more than 5 800 small businesses participated, between
March 28 and April 4, 2020. The results showed that, 43% of businesses had
closed for a time, and almost all of these closures happened because of the
pandemic. Respondents that had closed for the moment pointed to cutbacks in
demand and employee health worries as the reasons for closure, with
disturbances in the supply chain being less of an element. Relatively, the
businesses outlined having lessened their active employment by 39% since
January. The tail off was specifically sharp in the Mid-Atlantic district, where
54% of associations were closed and employment was reduced by 47%. The results
also claim that several businesses have been financially fragile. The same
survey of PNAS also showed that ‘’the median firm with monthly expenses over
$10,000 had only enough cash on hand to last roughly 2 weeks. Three-quarters of
respondents only had enough cash on hand to last 2 months or less.’’ As
expected, companies with more cash on hand were more cheerful that they would last
open by the end of the year.
Generally, in this world, there has been financial damage
from covid-19. This financial damage maybe has some similarities to the one on
2007-2009. This was a shock for banks, so some mortgage companies, which have
limited liquidity. Moreover, unemployment is high.
Nowadays, there are a lot of ways to reduce the unemployment,
because of the fact that many governments help their citizens. Specifically, in
Europe they share money in all countries, to solve these issues. Europe has
made some concessions to solve these economic problems with the leaders of
every European country. Between them they decided to make some financial plans,
for example giving money to companies or to people that need financial support.
In addition, many parents suggest to their children to start
saving money, because in the next months will have a destruction in economy.
To sum up, we should save money for ourselves and try taking care for our health. Now, we are living in a dangerous situation and we should care for vulnerable groups. No one knows if this pandemic will end. Also, if it will ever end, we do not know when, so everyone should hope that someday everything will return to normal. Some scientists also said that the vaccines are ready and everyone worldwide is waiting for this. Just like Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, in 2020 claimed ‘’Ultimately, the greatest lesson that COVID-19 can teach humanity is that we are all in this together.’’
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