Scientists across the world are racing to find a vaccine against the Covid-19 virus, which has battered the global economy. As the world awaits the discovery of a new vaccine, the chances of it being highly effective seem low. Although 50% effectiveness is still being viewed as acceptable, public health measures need to continue until a highly effective vaccine is found, macroeconomic influencers share their views on the Covid -19 impact.

Daniel Lacalle

Daniel Lacalle, chief economist Tressis SV, shared an article on White House coronavirus advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci views of the effectiveness of a coronavirus vaccine. Dr. Fauci noted that the chances of developing a vaccine that is highly effective are very narrow.

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The scientists currently working on vaccines are expecting that the vaccine would be at least 75% effective. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has noted that it would approve a vaccine if it was at least 50% effective.

Dr. Fauci noted that considering the relatively average effectiveness of the vaccines, the public health approach of social distancing and wearing face masks should not be abandoned.

Chad P. Bown

Chad P. Bown, Reginald Jones Senior Fellow at Peterson Institute for International Economics, shared an article warning how countries should not try to hoard Covid-19 vaccine once it is discovered.

Bown noted that wealthy countries that prioritise vaccine doses for themselves at the cost of poorer nations will lead to a failure in controlling the global pandemic. Countries such as the US and UK have already signed agreements with pharmaceutical companies to secure vast quantities of vaccine doses.

The article notes that considering the ability of the virus to spread from country to another, vaccinating one country at time will only prolong the pandemic and impact the global economy.

Colin Williams

Colin Williams, professor of public policy at the University of Sheffield, shared an article from the World Bank on how informality is aggravating the Covid-19 pandemic in emerging and developing economies (EMDEs). According to the World Bank, informality includes lack of development, widespread poverty, poor health and medical services, and insufficient access to financial systems.

Due to the lack of access to healthcare services and poor sanitation facilities, the pandemic is expected to have a higher impact on EMDEs. Further, lockdown measures impact the informal sector in these economies. For example, approximately 72% of companies in the service sector of these economies are informal.

Howard Archer

Howard Archer, Chief Economic Advisor to EY ITEM Club, shared an article on how following the increase in the number of companies planning to cut jobs in June in the UK, many companies have cut or threatening to cut jobs in July and early August.

The pandemic has led to increase in redundancies by five times. Approximately 1,778 companies planned to cut more than 139,000 jobs. The number of redundancies is expected to be higher than the last recession in 2008, according to the article.