Over the last two months, both infection and fatality rates have risen globally. COVID victims are getting younger. But it remains a positive fact that vaccination, in whatever context, reduces death rates and hospitalisation. However, the potential to circulate that comes with ‘re-opening’ enhances the virus’ capacity to mutate. The requisite caution and patience are not a given in an atmosphere of pandemic fatigue and with its macro impacts beginning to bite.

  • The end of the pandemic is not yet in sight. For the last nine consecutive weeks, COVID-19 infections have been rising globally (see chart below), and in many regions doing so at an alarming rate (particularly in India and Brazil). Last week, more than 5.2m new cases were recorded, the most since the pandemic started, followed by a subsequent increase in deaths. As the WHO Director General pointed out: “It took nine months to reach 1 million deaths, four months to reach 2 million and three months to reach 3 million deaths.” With the increase in vaccinations, the brunt of the virus’s spread is now shifting towards young adults.
  • Even in the US – a country that has one of the most successful vaccination campaigns in the world with more than 50% of adults having received at least one injection – cases and hospitalisations are currently rising. According to virologists and public health specialists, this is caused by (1) the more contagious B.1.1.7. strain (the culprit for a recent surge in Michigan) and (2) a rising sense of pandemic fatigue.

Source: Our World in Data, Axios visuals

  • BUT vaccination programmes are effective. They are saving lives and reducing hospitalisation regardless of (1) whether infections are rising or falling and (2) whether a particular country is grappling with one or several new variants. Recent studies corroborate this good news both in countries where cases have been falling for weeks (like the UK) and those still struggling to mitigate a third or fourth wave (like France).
  • The more a virus circulates, the faster it can mutate, which is the reason why the process of ‘reopening’ countries and regions could produce variants that may prove more resistant to vaccines. The conclusion: the pandemic won’t go away with the wave of a magic wand, and global “back to normal” in terms of activity (whatever this means) will take time. Industries such as hospitality, tourism, global events and international travel will be impaired until at least 2022 (a sign: the well-prepared Singapore-HK travel bubble burst again, cancelled at the last minute).
  • The structural damaging impact of the pandemic on all kinds of macro issues is just about to begin. It will be broad in terms of scope, with issues as diverse as the dramatic increase in global hunger and food insecurity, a narrowing of the middle class, the global discontent with governments (currently in full glare in Latin America) or the proliferation of zombie companies in high-income countries. Most importantly: all these risks will conflate with each other.