At times like these, best not to look too far forward. I am going with the ethos of my time is "Yesterday,Today and Tomorrow", and I suspect this is also the thinking of governments around the world, let's get through this, then deal with the aftermath.

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Yes David you would have thought in the post-morteum to events and actions taken, the world should have learned an awful lot from this. I suppose a little crumb is that we weren't face with a disease with a 50% death rate or more, this time.

As regards to the interaction and digestion of certain animals which pose us the greatest risk, I think this will be clamped down but not eradicated completely. In time as the world forgets, these markets will grow again, until the next time!

There needs to much clearer action plan in future, and a process where areas/countries/borders are shut down immediately. It seems however that the chinese are on holiday everywhere all the time with the sheer numbers of them, so containing still won't be an easy process.

I don't think many will be happy however until there are big steps taken as a result of this. The Chinese need to be held to account. We are all having to adapt. They will also have to adapt and move away from practises they have performed in the past. The only way for them to do this is to enforce the death penalty as a deterrent. Well, the impact as a result from their practises is like murder.

Yup - I'd be amazed if BA were to disappear in the next year, along with the other IAG members (Iberia, Aer Lingus). The likes of American Airlines will still be around too.

(For BA especially, it's an interesting one - they have dozens of old 747s and 777s, long since paid off, so that portion of the fleet is less of an issue. For those airlines with much newer fleets, or who lease their planes, a painful time lies ahead)

 

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On the other hand, I think by summer 2021 everything will be back to normal.

Yes I read this story and the BCP council insisting rents are paid in full when there is going to be no income is a disgrace! BCP are in clous cukoo land on this and many other things.Iam also a commercial property landlord and have given my tenants an 8 month rent reduction,it makes no sense to see your tenants go to the wall.

As an aside I would imagine and hope the Bournemouth air festival gets cancelled this year.

I don't think that is what the graph shows though? It just shows whether people think things are getting better or worse than the last month, see below tweet and definition. Not sure if showing a line graph like that is the best way to display this data (not sure what else is though, maybe some kind of cumulative graph?)

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/pmi.asp

 

 

3/ What does this mean in practice?

The surveyed managers in China who are in charge of making bulk goods orders (to stock supermarket shelves, for example) are about as pessimistic about the economy as they were last month... but not getting more depressed.

— Dmitry Grozoubinski (@DmitryOpines) March 31, 2020

Very optimistic of you. I doubt that everything will be back to the old normal ever. When it comes to package holidays, it will more likely be 2022 before things start to pick up in my view.

Don't forget that to prevent further waves of this virus, will require travel restrictions to be in place until a proven mass vaccination campaign can be implemented, or alternatively, herd immunity has become widespread and the virus attack has been blunted by that means.

 

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I'm still not convinced this virus wasn't an accidental escape from a biotech lab. Even if it wasn't it's only a matter of time before some thing does escape with huge consequences. The number of biotech labs, both government and private across the world is huge and regulation is extremely poor in some places. 

On the contrary, I think once we are more or less out of the woods and areas considered 'safe', I reckon there will be untold demand for flights.

As well as people finding it difficult to survive, on the flipside there are a lot of people on final salary schemes, good pensions etc who aren't spending anything now. They are saving tens of thousands because of this. Once we start to emerge from this hibernation, there will be a spending spree but demand will outstrip supply in many areas, not just aviation as many businesses would have closed, or take many months to come back up to speed. We need to be able to bounce out of the starting blocks once this is done.

I remember after the financial crisis, its not great now but there was a problem with new builds straight after as brick making companies had closed or halted production. Houses could not be built as there were no materials and some builders had to get things like bricks from overseas.

It could be to a country's advantage to be able to respond quickly once the people emerge again. They could be doing a lot of overseas businesses too if there are shortfalls there. With Brexit, this country should also see this as an opportunity, plan for the future.

If we close up completely or turn the tap off too much, our recovery economically will take many years longer.

I was talking to my sister today and she told me about what happened in Greece earlier this month. The orthodox church there decreed that Eucharist is safe and if people are true believers and they believe that they receive the body and blood of Christ, then they have nothing to worry. On the next day the chief medical officer (a devout Christian himself) closed all churches with immediate effect. A bishop was arrested for not complying.

Denmark appears to be about 1 week ahead of the UK. I still expect the UK government to start easing the lockdown at the end of April. It will come sooner than many expect. Whether or not it will be successful is a different question.

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We'll see, nobody knows as you say. It's the not the same kind of event, but I remember reading so many forecasts and theories of how the world would change after 9/11, most of them were completely wrong. 

As for the vaccine, I think we'll have started mass vaccination already by the end of the year. The urgency and the incentives are too great.

Yes, you are right.

Well the trade guy i follow on twitter was right, i hadnt got a clue until he explained it!

The Swedish govt is expecting a recession of 4% in 2020 with unemployment rising to 9%. I think they are being too optimistic!

Maybe. But this is a corona virus - if it was that easy, we would have a cure for the common cold by now. It also depends on what you mean by "mass vaccination" and where that is first carried out. Billions of doses would be required worldwide.

The good news on the vaccine front, is that laboratories worldwide have been trying to crack the RNA virus nut for several years now - the prize is immense if we could really vaccinate against such viruses.

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I think it's fair to say that March 2020 will go into the history books. Let's see what April brings (nervous laughter)...

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Updated mortality stats from Italy

Isn't the reason a cure for the common cold is so difficult is because it has so many variations??

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Speaking to a Chinese colleague this morning, aside from the data issues, those being reported are largely returnees from oversees, most from America. What she did say that treatments being used in the early stages in Wuhan are proving far less effective on these later cases which may lead to the conclusion that the virus is indeed mutating

Spain have reported 6,461 new cases and 473 new deaths in the 12-hour overnight update


That's a rise in new cases and fall in new deaths when compared to the same 12-hour period to Monday morning


New cases have increased by 1,376 whilst new deaths have fallen by 64

It's not so much variations, more the fact that it mutates too rapidly for a vaccine to be effective. It's the same with the flu and why you need a yearly vaccine for that.

If COVID-19 is found to mutate as rapidly as the flu does then I'd imagine it's here to stay...

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I've read several times (from scientific sources) that this virus is relatively stable so far, which should help with the development of a suitable vaccine.

We can be fairly optimistic that an effective vaccine will be developed - but it is very unlikely to hit the mass market in time for the 2021 holiday season.

Here is a recent and realistic article on the topic:

http://www.rfi.fr/en/science-and-technology/20200307-coronavirus-why-vaccine-will-take-least-12-months

 

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Good news then!

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