Speaker 1: Welcome to Prognosis. I'm Laura Carlson. It's day two d
Speaker 1: and twenty one since coronavirus was declared a global pandemic.
Speaker 1: Today's main story. By all outward appearances, Europe seems to
Speaker 1: be entering a frightening coronavirus deja vu at the moment,
Speaker 1: COVID nine cases are rising quickly and several countries are
Speaker 1: threatening widespread lockdowns. A closer look, though, reveals Europe's second
Speaker 1: wave is very different from its first. But first, here's
Speaker 1: what happened in virus News today. Global coronavirus cases have
Speaker 1: exceeded forty million, with a pandemic showing no signs of slowing.
Speaker 1: Infections have reached record numbers across Europe, while the US
Speaker 1: and India are averaging more than fifty thousand cases a day.
Speaker 1: Although it took six months for the worldwide tally to
Speaker 1: reach ten million cases, subsequent milestones have come increasingly faster,
Speaker 1: with the latest ten million cases added in just thirty
Speaker 1: two days. Global cases reached a single day record of
Speaker 1: more than four hundred and fifteen thousand on Friday. China's
Speaker 1: economic recovery continues to accelerate thanks to an aggressive coronavirus
Speaker 1: containment policy that has allowed local factories to reopen. China's
Speaker 1: eastern port city of ching Dao conducted ten point nine
Speaker 1: million coronavirus tests in only five days after thirteen infections
Speaker 1: were discovered in the city. It's another demonstration of China's
Speaker 1: ambitious strategy in mass testing wherever infections are reported. Ching
Speaker 1: Dao's campaign was completed roughly three times faster than a
Speaker 1: similar experiment by Wuhan in May. Chinese cities have adopted
Speaker 1: a batch testing method that enables as many as ten
Speaker 1: samples to be assessed simultaneously. However, the strategy is rarely
Speaker 1: used in Western countries, who have questioned the methods accuracy
Speaker 1: and credibility. In the Czech Republic, hundreds clashed with riot
Speaker 1: police in protest against social distancing rules and other measures
Speaker 1: imposed by the government in an attempt to stem the
Speaker 1: most acute spread of the coronavirus in Europe. The police
Speaker 1: used tear gas, water cannons, and an armored personnel carrier
Speaker 1: to disperse some two thousand protesters who assembled at the
Speaker 1: city's Old Town Square. Meanwhile, Poland has started a construction
Speaker 1: of the first field hospital for COVID nineteen patients at
Speaker 1: Warsaw's National Stadium. The facility has planned to have five
Speaker 1: hundred beds and will fully be ready later this week,
Speaker 1: which brings us to today's main story. Millions of Europeans
Speaker 1: are facing tighter restrictions on their movements. London, Paris and
Speaker 1: Vienna are enforcing stricter curbs, while Ireland is preparing some
Speaker 1: of the region's toughest measures. On Monday, the government of
Speaker 1: Whales announced a two week firebreak lockdown designed to curb
Speaker 1: the spread of the coronavirus. All non essential retail outlets,
Speaker 1: including pubs and restaurants, will be closed from October to
Speaker 1: November nine. I spoke with Bloomberg reporter Katherine Boseley but
Speaker 1: how Europe is hoping to control this new wave of
Speaker 1: coronavirus infections and whether another round of restrictions and lockdowns
Speaker 1: can offset the economic devastation in the region the pandemic
Speaker 1: has already caused. On Monday, Wales announced that was going
Speaker 1: into a two week firebreak lockdown um a response to
Speaker 1: the resurgence of COVID nineteen cases we're seeing throughout Europe,
Speaker 1: and I was just wondering if you might unpack what
Speaker 1: is driving this new wave. Well, governments are scratching their
Speaker 1: heads just like everyone else. One hypothesis is that it's
Speaker 1: the cold weather we've had. The weather changed for the
Speaker 1: fall about two weeks ago, which was sort of in
Speaker 1: time with the resurgence and cases. And with the cold weather,
Speaker 1: people spend more time indoors, which means that they're more
Speaker 1: encrowded rooms and that seems to be an ideal breeding
Speaker 1: ground for the virus. Most European governments seem to have
Speaker 1: acknowledged that a second wave was always possible, but this
Speaker 1: wave seems to be much larger and much more difficult
Speaker 1: to contain than expected. So what went wrong Well there,
Speaker 1: it's not clear if it's really larger. Certainly we've had
Speaker 1: more positive tests than in numerical terms than we did
Speaker 1: in March and April. However, scientists in Germany have hypothesized
Speaker 1: that in fact it may be that there is wider
Speaker 1: testing now available and in effect, had there been as
Speaker 1: many tests available back in the in the early spring,
Speaker 1: that the tests would have been much higher. So it's
Speaker 1: not clear. The hospitalizations now are generally, I think, still
Speaker 1: lower than they were in the spring. European countries are
Speaker 1: facing an uphill battle, it seems when it comes to
Speaker 1: lockdown fatigue. What's the sense of whether Europeans are willing
Speaker 1: to go through another phase of tighter restrictions. Well, I
Speaker 1: think certainly the government's had a lot of more public
Speaker 1: goodwill during the first round of lockdowns and that the
Speaker 1: political capital is definitely expiring and people are getting pretty frustrated.
Speaker 1: There was a protest in a little town in Italy
Speaker 1: I think last week when people when it was announced
Speaker 1: that there would be a new round of restrictions, people
Speaker 1: just kind of said they'd had enough. And obviously there
Speaker 1: had been protests also, for example in Germany of people
Speaker 1: um arguing that there, you know, civil liberties were being
Speaker 1: infringed by the government. So there definitely is an element
Speaker 1: of of lockdown fatigue, and clearly that is I think
Speaker 1: one of the reasons why governments, for example Italy all Switzerland,
Speaker 1: they are trying to keep the economy alive or trying
Speaker 1: to be as targeted as possible rather than a blanket crackdown,
Speaker 1: because the more people's livelihoods are at stake, the more
Speaker 1: the less likely they will be to to cooperate. If
Speaker 1: you were to identify one success case in Europe. Do
Speaker 1: you see one country potentially weathering the storm better than
Speaker 1: it's comparative neighbors. It's very difficult to say. I would
Speaker 1: say that certainly Germany and Switzerland have weathered the storm
Speaker 1: better than many other countries. I mean many other countries then,
Speaker 1: for example, um France and Spain, both in entire terms
Speaker 1: of healthcare and in terms of um cost to the economy.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't necessarily mean that that is because the
Speaker 1: policies that they enacted were the Germany or Switzerland enacted
Speaker 1: were better. It may just be that obviously they had
Speaker 1: um more robust health care systems because they are are
Speaker 1: are wealthy countries and the nature of their economies are
Speaker 1: perhaps not as oriented to tourism and service sector. Then
Speaker 1: are the areas of economic activity that the pandemic disproportionately affects,
Speaker 1: And so thinking about these systems and that economic impact
Speaker 1: from the pandemic, I mean, what are the broader plans
Speaker 1: that European leaders are are hoping to do and have
Speaker 1: already done to try and offset this negative economic impact
Speaker 1: from a potential general lockdown that might be coming down
Speaker 1: the road, or just in general tighter restrictions. When the
Speaker 1: pandemic initially hit earlier this year, governments replicated, UM, we're
Speaker 1: very eager to replicate Germany's model of quote sabites, which
Speaker 1: are furlough programs and which basically the government peace companies
Speaker 1: which who have to uh suspend work due to the
Speaker 1: economic crisis and therefore people get paid at least partial
Speaker 1: part of their salaries UM and and get laid off.
Speaker 1: That's the idea that's been very widely used. It where
Speaker 1: they used in Britain, it was used in France, it
Speaker 1: was used in Spain, Germany, Switzerland and Austria. Though it's
Speaker 1: very common they're already before the crisis though this was
Speaker 1: really the key own of UM of many countries response.
Speaker 1: In addition, they gave out various loans interest free, free
Speaker 1: or low interest loans to companies that were affected UM
Speaker 1: and then there was also a moratorium on insolvencies, so
Speaker 1: companies that were um, you know, at risk of of
Speaker 1: going belly up actually were sort of got a stay
Speaker 1: of execution. So those policies are likely to continue. There's
Speaker 1: obviously also in a bit more less immediate but bigger impact,
Speaker 1: there is the use seven D and fifty billion euro
Speaker 1: rescue fund that's likely to sort of be more of
Speaker 1: a driver for the recovery. But it's quite clear that
Speaker 1: all these fiscal and also monetary policy stimuli will have
Speaker 1: to be left in place, and it's now is definitely
Speaker 1: you know, policy makers have warned now is not the
Speaker 1: time to withdraw stibulus. Is there a worry that this
Speaker 1: stimulus cannot last the length potentially that we're looking at
Speaker 1: for this pandemic that now that we are facing the
Speaker 1: reality that we won't necessarily or potentially have a vaccine
Speaker 1: until one, is there a concern that the stimulus just
Speaker 1: simply cannot continue for the length of time that we
Speaker 1: may be facing. Yes and no. Of course, in in
Speaker 1: in theory, that is always a concern, and certainly I
Speaker 1: think in in Britain those where there was a dispute
Speaker 1: about the expiry of the furlough program, and now in
Speaker 1: the North of England the government has had to announce
Speaker 1: new support measures for for municipalities that have gone into
Speaker 1: lockdown a second time. On the other hand, you know,
Speaker 1: policymakers generally, for example in Germany, have been very very
Speaker 1: eager to stress that you know, these support measures are
Speaker 1: not going to expire any time soon. So what might
Speaker 1: be a successful roadmap for Europe going forward? Again, if
Speaker 1: we're thinking about a pandemic that might be here for
Speaker 1: the next at least until the end of what might
Speaker 1: be a way to look forward and prevent wider lockdowns,
Speaker 1: wider restrictions and offset that negative economic impact. Well, I
Speaker 1: think you're asking me the million dollar question that nobody
Speaker 1: has the answer to. UM, certainly, I think the you know,
Speaker 1: golden way will would be to styra corpse, in which
Speaker 1: you're able to keep a grip on or a lid
Speaker 1: on infections and certainly on serious cases and deaths, and
Speaker 1: at the same time manage the economy in such a
Speaker 1: way that people are still as much as possible able
Speaker 1: to go to work and live as normal lives as
Speaker 1: they can. That's clearly what the government in Italy is
Speaker 1: trying to do. The government in switzerlanda is as well.
Speaker 1: UM Germany I think also UM is probably going to
Speaker 1: try to find a middle ground somewhere, and in an
Speaker 1: ideal case, French Finance Minister Lumier has said, you know that, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, a second real lockdown is just going to
Speaker 1: be incredibly costly for the economy, so they're just going
Speaker 1: to have to try and see what works to to
Speaker 1: satisfy both the economic and the health care imperatives. So
Speaker 1: in terms of this recent announcement by Whales in which
Speaker 1: everything is shut down anything considered non essential, it doesn't
Speaker 1: sound necessarily like this is something many European leaders want
Speaker 1: to do or are thinking that there is tolerance for
Speaker 1: going forward, that there will be additional restrictions, but not
Speaker 1: an overall lockdown approach as similar to what we saw
Speaker 1: in March or April. Well, it's hard to say. Maybe,
Speaker 1: of course, if if the situation, the healthcare situation becomes worse,
Speaker 1: and we're already seeing you know, record infections, it gets
Speaker 1: even worse in hospitals become overburdened, they may have a
Speaker 1: little choice. That said, you know, the public is aware
Speaker 1: of the economic costs that all of these these measures
Speaker 1: have had, so and of course these are are also voters,
Speaker 1: so I have politicians will have to figure out how
Speaker 1: to essentially square the circle. Germany never really had a
Speaker 1: full full lockdown the way France or Spain had so
Speaker 1: um and managed to get through the first wave very well.
Speaker 1: So I think that there will be a politicians and
Speaker 1: decision makers across across your car just going to have
Speaker 1: to try and take baby steps and and do the
Speaker 1: best that they can. That was Katherine Boseley, and that's
Speaker 1: it for our show today. For coverage of the outbreak
Speaker 1: from one and twenty bureaus around the world, visit bloomberg
Speaker 1: dot com slash coronavirus and if you like the show,
Speaker 1: please leave us a review and a rating on Apple
Speaker 1: Podcasts or Spotify. It's the best way to help more
Speaker 1: listeners find our global reporting. The Prognosis Daily edition is
Speaker 1: produced by Tophor Forheaz, Jordan Gospore, Magnus Henrickson, and me
Speaker 1: Laura Carlson. Today's main story was reported by Catherine Bosley.
Speaker 1: Original music by Leo Sidrin. Our editors are Rick Shine
Speaker 1: and Francesco Levi. Francesco Levi is Bloomberg's head of podcasts.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening.