The next calamity
It is in the rich world’s self-interest to help
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THE NEW
coronavirus is causing havoc in rich countries. Often overlooked is the
damage it will cause in poor ones, which could be even worse. Official
data do not begin to tell the story. As of March 25th Africa had
reported only 2,800 infections so far; India, only 650. But the virus is
in nearly every country and will surely spread. There is no vaccine.
There is no cure. A very rough guess is that, without a campaign of
social distancing, between 25% and 80% of a typical population will be
infected. Of these, perhaps 4.4% will be seriously sick and a third of
those will need intensive care. For poor places, this implies calamity.
Social
distancing is practically impossible if you live in a crowded slum.
Hand-washing is hard if you have no running water (see article).
Governments may tell people not to go out to work, but if that means
their families will not eat, they will go out anyway. If prevented, they
may riot.
So covid-19 could soon be
all over poor countries. And their health-care systems are in no
position to cope. Many cannot deal with the infectious diseases they
already know, let alone a new and highly contagious one. Health spending
per head in Pakistan is one two-hundredth the level in America. Uganda
has more government ministers than intensive-care beds. Throughout
history, the poor have been hardest-hit by pandemics. Most people who
die of AIDS are African. The Spanish flu wiped out 6% of India’s entire population.
Dozens of developing countries have ordered lockdowns. India has announced a “total ban” on leaving home for 21 days (see article). South Africa has deployed the army to help enforce one. They may slow the disease, but they are unlikely to stop it.
Many
places are still in denial. Street markets in Myanmar are packed.
Brazil’s populist president, Jair Bolsonaro, dismisses covid-19 as just
“a sniffle” (see article).
Some leaders are clueless. Tanzania’s president, John Magufuli, said
churches should stay open because the coronavirus is “satanic” and
“cannot survive in the body of Christ”. Many autocrats see covid-19 as a
handy excuse to tighten their grip. Expect some to ban political
rallies, postpone elections and extend surveillance over citizens’ daily
lives—all to protect public health, of course.
Granted,
there are some reasons for hope. Poor countries are young—the median
age in Africa is under 20—and the young appear less likely to die from
an infection. The poorest are very rural: two-thirds of people in
countries with incomes per head below $1,000 a year live in the
countryside, compared with less than a fifth in rich countries. Farmers
can grow yams without breathing viral droplets on each other. The
climate may help. It is possible, though far from certain, that hot
weather slows the spread of covid-19. Some places have useful
experience. Countries that endured Ebola learned a lot about
hand-washing, contact-tracing and securing public trust.
Alas,
even the good news comes with caveats. People in poor countries may be
young, but they often have weak lungs or immune systems, because of
malnutrition, tuberculosis or HIV. Rural folk may get the
virus later, but they will probably still get it. Lockdowns will be
hard to sustain unless governments can provide a generous safety-net.
Firms need credit to avoid laying off staff. Informal workers need cash
to tide them over. Unfortunately, poor countries do not have the
financial muscle to provide these things, and covid-19 has just made it
much harder.
Demand has collapsed for
the commodities on which many emerging markets depend, from crude oil to
fresh flowers. Tourism has tanked. No one wants to visit the Masai Mara
or Machu Picchu just now. Foreign investors have pulled $83bn from
emerging markets since the start of the crisis, the largest capital
outflow ever recorded, says the Institute of International Finance, a
trade group. Remittances, usually a safety-net in hard times, may tumble
as migrants in rich countries lose their jobs.
Many
poor and middle-income countries face a balance-of-payments crisis and a
collapse in government revenues as they need to raise health-related
spending and imports (to reduce the death toll) and welfare (so that
workers can isolate themselves without running out of money). Whereas
governments in rich countries can borrow cheaply in a crisis as
investors flock to safety, poor countries see their borrowing costs
soar. The trade-off between saving lives and saving livelihoods is
excruciating. The worry, as Imran Khan, Pakistan’s prime minister says,
is that “if we shut down the cities...we will save [people] from corona
at one end, but they will die from hunger.”
Far from helping, many better-off countries have taken a nationalist turn. Some places, such as the EU,
are restricting the export of medical kit. That goes against the values
they profess to hold. Other countries, such as Kazakhstan, are curbing
exports of food, which is not in short supply. If global trade is gummed
up, the economic damage will be far greater. For poor countries that
rely on imported food, it could be deadly.
Since
so much remains unknown about covid-19, any response must be based on
imperfect information. But some things are both urgent and obvious.
Governments in poor countries, as elsewhere, should supply people with
timely, accurate information, by any means practical. No cover-ups, no
internet shut-downs, no arresting of those who share unwelcome news.
Time to be generous
The rich world, meanwhile, should help the poor world swiftly and copiously. The IMF says it is ready to deploy its $1trn lending capacity. Much more may be needed. As The Economist went to press, the G20
was about to set out a plan. It should be generous. Some of those vast
rich-world bail-out pots should be used to cushion the suffering of the
global south. China is winning influence with high-profile deliveries of
medical equipment. Poor countries will remember who helped them.
As past campaigns against malaria and HIV
showed, it takes a co-ordinated global effort to roll back a global
scourge. It is too late to avoid a large number of deaths, but not too
late to avert catastrophe. And it is in rich countries’ interests to
think globally as well as locally. If covid-19 is left to ravage the
emerging world, it will soon spread back to the rich one. ■
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This article appeared in the Leaders section of the print edition under the headline "The next calamity"
