The most comforting stories are those
with happy endings. Our nirvana in the midst of Covid-19 would be the
production of a tested vaccine that is...
widely available across advanced
and developing countries. Before we attain this perfect state, we have
to trust in our elected leaders and decision-takers. Being human, they
make mistakes, so we have to hope that they make many more good
decisions than bad ones.
They want to eradicate the virus but
they cannot preside over the devastation of the economy for which they
are responsible. We are at the point where our governments have started
to ease the restrictions or are deciding how, and at what pace they can
reverse the lockdown. Politicians will say that they are guided by the
scientists and the medics, not that these groups of experts have uniform
opinions. In practice, they will listen to their chosen experts as well
as business leaders before announcing the way forward.
Technology has a leading role to play.
If such existed, we could all wear biometric bracelets that measured our
body temperature and heart rate, and allowed our governments to store
and analyze the data. Herein lies one route to disrupting the chains of
infection but also, as noted by a prominent Israeli academic, to
unprecedented surveillance of our lives.
Without the bracelets and under obvious
time pressures, we have to make do with less in terms of technology.
Country examples abound. In Ghana, for example, drones have been used
since the start of April to transport test samples for the virus from
rural areas to government laboratories. This boosted the number of tests
taken to what the authorities claimed was the highest in Africa on a
per head basis.
In Kenya the agriculture ministry has
said that it will not renew the licenses of the tea and coffee auction
houses if they do not migrate to online platforms within two months.
Media reports say that the coffee auctions had been closed to halt the
spread of the virus, leading, we assume to delays in paying farmers and
exporting product.
Technology hastened the dilution of the
lockdown in the first case, and will facilitate it in the second. The
mobile phone is probably the most useful tool available to governments.
It could deliver a successful outcome for ‘test, trace and isolate’
provided that enough users take part. Contact tracing requires a certain
level of familiarity with mobiles and of trust in the government.
Another application is for the
distribution of surveys to guide governments as they plot their full
exit from lockdown. The focus could be behavioural. The questions could
ask if we are ready to use public transport again, if we would be
comfortable returning to work subject to social distancing or if we
would consider visiting a restaurant. Alternatively, they could create a
picture of peoples’ conduct, and see how we have complied with
restrictions and how far we would live with their extension.
As our leaders move to ease the
restrictions on our lives, they can draw on technology to help them.
Ultimately, however, they have to make the decisions on our behalf. They
can see how their counterparts elsewhere acted although there are flaws
in country comparisons. They are necessarily fumbling in the dark with a
new threat and we can only hope they get it right.
Gregory Kronsten is the Head, Macroeconomics and Fixed Income Research, FBNQuest
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