The world came to learn about a certain strange disease outbreak, in Wuhan China, in the last quarter of 2019. With symptoms like that of a common cold, the virus causing it was highly infectious and more deadly. By then scientists were only calling it the Novel Corona Virus, it was not until later that it was officially named the Corona Virus Disease of 2019 or COVID-19, after the virus that was causing it and the World Health Organisation declared it a global pandemic. It is now 2021, and the world has never been the same.
As of the 6th February, the total number of recorded infections stood at 106 million worldwide. There has been a number of vaccines that have been in development, recently a single-dose vaccine that Russia announced to have developed in August 2020, although was received with skepticism, has shown early signs of being the best so far.
The world currently has rolled a vaccine developed by Pfizer which was approved by CDC and the FDA. That seems like great news, however, Bloomberg, using their calculator reports that it will take more than seven (7) years at the rate at which the vaccine is being deployed for the whole world to reach 75% vaccination, which has been set as the threshold for life to get back to normal.
Going by Bloomberg calculated timeframe, this article has looked at how delayed vaccination can impact the economy of Zambia, and has also raised some questions to keep readers thinking. It should be noted that this article is not an endorsement of anything.
The coming of Covid 19 has brought detrimental consequences to the health of the global economy worse off the economies of third world countries like Zambia. With the January annual rate of inflation at 21.5%, way above the 2021 targeted single digit bracket of 6-8% by the ministry of finance, Zambia’s economic growth has been hampered severely by Covid 19.
The minister of finance during the 2021 budget presentation speech acknowledged the difficulties the country faced in executing the strategies meant to achieve the objectives set in the 2020 national budget. “Mr Speaker, execution of the 2020 budget has been challenging mainly due to the impact of Covid-19 pandemic,” the minister of finance said, during his 2021 budget presentation to parliament.
The country’s current stock of external debt stands at US$11.97 (Ministry of Finance, 2020), real GDP growth in 2021 projected to change by -4.8%, the domestic currency is trading above K21 per US$ and the PMI failing to break the 50.0 index point from 2019 (Markit Economics, 2021), with January recording a 47.7 index which is a fall from the 49.0 index point of the previous month, can Zambia handle such economic distress for seven (7) years? It seems unlikely.
This is not to say the economic woes Zambia has been facing are wholly a consequence of Covid-19, the country’s economy started taking a ‘nosedive’ before the pandemic was even first recorded. Covid-19, however, has been the biggest contributor especially to businesses in the country.
As of today Bars & Night Clubs are only allowed to operate on a takeaway basis and only on weekends and restaurants cannot operate the way they normally operate; this has led to the loss of revenue for both the owners and their employees. If this trend continues, there is likelihood of people losing their homes, especially those who rent and that will lead to more revenue losses by landowners.
Travel restrictions caused the hospitality industry to also lose out on revenue in the year 2020, a further continuation of this might lead to the closure of most hotels and lodges especially those in the tourist capital of Zambia, Livingstone. Due to the pandemic, Taj Pamodzi Hotel had to close from April 2020 to September 2020, and in its trading statement for the half-year ended 30th September 2020, the hotel admitted to having lost a considerable amount of income during the closure. Now imagine, the damage Covid-19 will have if the vaccine is delayed; in one year, all this has happened.
CNN has been publishing reports of fears among scientists, who are of the view that there might be more variants to the virus that might emerge, like the one first reported in the UK, South Africa, and Brazil. If this is the case, will the current vaccine, which was developed based on the first wave of the virus, be able to offer protection against the new strains of the virus?
According to Johnson & Johnson their Single-Shot Janssen Vaccine which is in development shows evidence of protection against the new variants. “Among all participants from different geographies and including those with the emerging viral variant, Janssen’s COVID-19 vaccine candidate was 66% effective overall in preventing moderate to severe COVID-19, 28 days after vaccination”, noted a publication on Johnson & Johnson’s company website. The question now is; should Zambia instead wait for this vaccine or go ahead and use the one that has been rolled out to the world already?
At the rate at which the economy is going down, life in Zambia will prove to be very difficult for most, if no measures are taken to ensure that businesses get back to operating normally, sooner than later.