Sino File | Is the coronavirus fatal for economic globalisation?
- The Covid-19 outbreak will foist profound changes on the world’s future development in terms of economics, society, diplomacy and geopolitics
- On top of this, the pandemic may also be a catalyst for restructuring global governance and supply chains
Covid-19 has already brought almost all the world’s major economies to their knees. The worst-case scenario is that it might bring about a global recession, as it has spread to more than 100 countries, and the human casualties and economic losses are still escalating.
Though the scale of its reach might be unseen in human history, the final toll in casualties and economic losses can be quantitatively measured once the outbreak is over. However, its longer-term consequences and fallout might not be so easily quantified, as the pandemic will foist inescapably significant and profound changes on the world’s future development in terms of economics, society, diplomacy and geopolitics.
With the pace of economic integration and globalisation in the past few decades, we all now live in a global village. Not only are our economies inextricably and inexorably tied together, but direct person-to-person contact is so frequent and intense that the world is all the more vulnerable to pandemics.
Though the novel coronavirus is thought to have originated in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, it has become a life-and-death fight between Mother Nature and human beings from any country. In this regard, the Covid-19 outbreak has raised serious questions about global public health security and the enforcement of health regulations around the world.
It is imperative that enforcement of global health regulations is strengthened, as many in the West believe China’s failure to implement some of the IHR requirements – such as transparency and the timely release of accurate information, at least in the early stages of the outbreak – was to blame for a localised health scare turning into a global pandemic.
