Everyone on Earth is undoubtedly aware of the spiraling health-scare. It emerged from Wuhan, China where markets caters to some very strange dietary proclivities. Apparently they eat bat soup, and the food market in Wuhan sells everything you can think of in the way of wild animals for food. The news is full of evacuations, quarantines and the medical evaluation of all passengers traveling from, not only that region, but all of China. Many flights to and from China have been canceled, though the virus has spread to other countries. There have been a handful of cases of the coronavirus in the United States.
According to reports leaking out, the doctors who first warned about the contagion and the potential for an epidemic have been arrested by the communist Chinese regime. Apparently these warnings were aired without its approval.Similarly, citizens who have criticized the regime’s handling of the outbreak and alleged that far more people have been effected than is officially acknowledged, have diasappeared or been silenced. Even those thought to have been in contact with the “infected” are being dragged from their homes and forcefully quarantined.
One of the most concerning facts about this mutant virus, thought to have been transferred from the animal kingdom to humans, is that it has a fourteen day incubation period. The danger is that the virus may be able to be transmitted even before a carrier has any symptoms. China has reportedly closed businesses, shops and more importantly factories that produce products that are exported all over the globe. As we’re all aware, many of the products in our stores are manufactured there, including big ticket items such as appliances, cars, and auto-parts. China accounts for 16% of the world’s economy.
The coronavirus is more than just a health-scare. It may go on to have a profound economic impact. The closing of factories and stores will certainly affect the Chinese economy. The question is what impact it will have on every other nation on earth.
There have been those warning that communist management of the Chinese economy would lead to its eventual downfall, and that was before the current panic. Stock markets around the world have been reacting to coronavirus news. Even the U.S. markets registered an immediate dip followed by an apparent recovery. At this writing, financial experts are wary about making predictions. But airlines have already been hit, along with other forms of mass transportation.
As the whole world must know, U.S. trade with China has been a subject of focus for the Trump Presidency. Phase One of a newly negotiated trade deal has been announced, and a comprehensive arrangement is waiting in the wings if all parties continue to cooperate. The advent of the coronavirus may well factor in expectations, as no one yet knows whether we’re facing a pandemic that will continue to spread.
Health experts are looking to past incidents of incurable epidemics for guidance, and there have been several. Whether the bird-flu, SARS, the swine flu or Ebola, we’ve seen these kinds of viral panics in the past. None of them rose to the pandemic plagues that were feared. But then there are the plagues prophesied in the last book of the Bible. Let’s hope and pray this isn’t the one that gets away.
