US needs less costly anti-virus plan

Washington – There’s litt le doubt that government-ordered business shutdowns to stop the spread of Covid-19 damaged the US economy, but the exact cost has not been clear.

Researchers from HEC Paris business school and Bocconi University in Milan have reached a sobering calculation: the closures beginning at the pandemic’s onset in March through May saved 29 000 lives at a cost of about $6 million (about R92 million) per person.

“Governors saved lives on the one hand, but reduced economic activity on the other,” Jean-Noel Barrot, a professor at HEC Paris and member of France’s National Assembly, said.

How to address the coronavirus outbreak has become a vexing, politically charged question in the US, where the virus has infected more than 12.2 million people and killed nearly 257 000. Virus cases are surging nationwide, prompting many states to again implement restrictions on businesses. The March orders caused unprecedented disruptions to the economy.

Critics have said the restrictions, which were relaxed to varying degrees in the northern spring and summer, are a costly assault on personal freedom, while supporters say they’re one of the ways the out-of-control virus can be contained.

A June study published in Nature found that without social distancing and business restrictions, cases in the US would have hit 5.2 million in early April, rather than 365 000. “What we need to think of [are] contingency plans to avoid having to burn so much of our collective wealth to stay alive,” Barrot said. –