In twelve months, the coronavirus has paralyzed economies, devastated entire communities, and put nearly four billion people under lockdown, confined to their homes. The past year has changed the world like no other, at least since a generation, perhaps since World War II.
More than 1.7 million people have died. At least 82 million have contracted the Covid virus – a figure probably underestimated. Children have lost parents, grandparents have been taken away, spouses mourned the solitary death of a loved one when hospital visits were deemed too risky due to contagion. “This pandemic experience is unique in the life of every contemporary on Earth,” says Sten Vermund, an infectious disease epidemiologist and dean of Yale University’s School of Public Health. “In some way or another, each of us has been impacted by it.”
The extent of the disaster is barely imaginable when, on December 31, 2019, the Chinese authorities report 27 cases of viral pneumonia of unknown origin in Wuhan, central China. The next day, authorities close the Wuhan live animal market considered related to the emergence of the virus.
On January 7, Chinese officials announce that a new virus has been isolated, named 2019-nCov. On the 11th, China announces the first death in Wuhan. Within days, cases appear across Asia, in France, and the United States.
By the end of January, countries begin repatriating their citizens from China. Borders close, and more than 50 million residents of Wuhan province, Hubei, are placed in quarantine. Images of a man dead on a Wuhan sidewalk, still masked, a plastic bag in hand, testify to the terror that has gripped the city, even though no official ever confirmed the exact cause of his death.
When the ship “Diamond Princess” docks in Japan in early February, over 700 passengers on board have contracted the virus and 13 have died. The horror has gone global, and the race for a vaccine has already begun. A small German company, BioNTech, sets aside its cancer research to focus on a new project. Its name: “Lightning Speed.”
On February 11, WHO names the new disease, called Covid-19. Four days later, France announces the first death recorded outside Asia. Europe watches in horror as northern Italy becomes the disease’s epicenter on the continent.
Italy, then Spain, France, and Great Britain, declare lockdowns. WHO declares Covid-19 a pandemic. The borders of the United States, already closed to China, shut to most European countries. For the first time in peacetime, the Summer Olympics are postponed.
By mid-April, 3.9 billion people, half of humanity, are experiencing some form of lockdown. From Paris to New York, Delhi to Lagos, and London to Buenos Aires, the eerie silence of deserted streets is pierced only by the sirens of ambulances, a reminder that death lurks.
For decades, scientists warned of the risk of a global pandemic without being heard. Now, even the wealthiest countries are at a loss against the invisible enemy. In a globalized economy, halted supply chains spark panic buying in supermarket aisles.
Chronic underinvestment in public health infrastructures is starkly exposed as hospitals struggle to keep their overwhelmed intensive care units afloat. Underpaid and overwhelmed staff fight without protection.
In New York, the world’s largest concentration of billionaires, healthcare workers are photographed wearing garbage bags as protection. A field hospital has been set up in Central Park. Mass graves are dug on Hart Island, off the Bronx.
Bodies pile up in refrigerated trucks, awaiting bulldozers to dig immense mass graves.
Businesses close. Schools and universities too. Sporting events are canceled. Civil air traffic is practically suspended, suffering the worst crisis in its history. Shops, bars, clubs, and restaurants shut their doors. In Spain, the confinement is so strict that children cannot leave their homes. People find themselves trapped, locked in tiny apartments for weeks sometimes.
Those who can work from home. Videoconferences replace meetings, travel, and celebrations. Those whose jobs require their presence risk their lives or jobs. By May, the pandemic has wiped out 20 million jobs in the United States.
The World Bank predicts that in 2021, 150 million people could fall into extreme poverty due to the recession. Social inequalities that have worsened over the years are now more glaring than ever.
Hugs, embraces, and even handshakes are now just memories. Exchanges occur through masks and plexiglass panels. Domestic violence surges, as do psychological problems. While wealthier city dwellers retreat to vacation homes or the countryside and governments flounder in the face of the crisis’s breadth, anger seethes among those locked in the city.
The United States, one of the world’s leading economies but without universal healthcare, rapidly becomes the hardest-hit country – more than 300,000 deaths by year-end – but President Donald Trump has consistently downplayed the threat, promoting hypothetical treatments like hydroxychloroquine, or even the idea of treating with bleach…
In May, the U.S. government launches Operation Warp Speed, allocating $11 billion to develop a vaccine by the year’s end. Donald Trump mentions it as the most massive American effort since developing the atomic bomb during World War II.
But neither the rich nor the powerful can buy their immunity, and in October, Trump is infected like Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro before him in July. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson spent three days in intensive care in April. Cristiano Ronaldo, one of the greatest footballers of his generation, tennis champion Novak Djokovic, and even Madonna, Prince Charles, and Prince Albert II of Monaco tested positive for Covid. And on December 17, it’s Emmanuel Macron’s turn to test positive.
As the year draws to a close, the first vaccines hit the market. American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, together with BioNTech, announces the development of a vaccine “90% effective.” The market soars, and governments scramble to secure stocks. A week later, American company Moderna ups the ante by announcing a vaccine “95% effective.”
Governments prepare to administer millions of doses starting with the elderly, healthcare workers, and the most vulnerable categories before extending vaccination to the rest of the population, the only possible ticket back to normalcy.
In December, Great Britain becomes the first Western country to authorize the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, with China and Russia having already begun campaigns with their vaccines. The U.S. soon follows, starting vaccinations, and Europe should give the green light around Christmas.
With the wealthiest countries scrambling to stockpile, 2021 is set to open with international competition around vaccines: China and Russia will compete to promote theirs, cheaper, primarily in Africa and Latin America.
At this point, it’s challenging to estimate the pandemic’s lasting marks on societies. For some experts, it may take years to achieve mass immunity. Others bet on a return to normalcy by mid-2021.
For some, the pandemic could foster a more flexible approach to telecommuting or even partial relocation of production chains. Others argue that fear of large gatherings will have profound consequences on transportation, tourism, and sports and cultural events.
The impact on civil liberties is another cause for concern. According to Freedom House analysts, democracy and human rights have already deteriorated in 80 countries in response to the virus.
The global economy is preparing for new upheavals: the International Monetary Fund worries about a recession worse than that following the 2008 financial crisis.
Covid-19 is not, by far, the deadliest pandemic in history. The bubonic plague in the 14th century wiped out a quarter of the world’s population. At least 50 million died from the Spanish flu in 1918-1919, and 33 million from AIDS in 40 years. But the current crisis, brutal and of global scope, has disrupted our interconnected world and the soul of our societies, undoubtedly for a very long time.
