"There Will Be No Return To The Old Normal For The Foreseeable Future," WHO Director-General Says

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

1. Right. We are at present in the very beginning of a new world.

I've been using this example. Say it's spring, 1939, and you and I are planning to go to Europe next year. It's going to be a wonderful trip. We've been saving up for a couple of years now. We're still working out all the details, but we're hoping to go to London, Paris, Rome, Venice, Naples, Madrid, and lots of other places.

But then September rolls around and WWII breaks out. It's clear our trip to Europe is postponed. We're hoping that the war won't last very long, and we can take our trip in 1941. But the war goes on and on. It's not over until May, 1945. The soonest we'll get to Europe will be 1946, maybe a year or two after that. And when we finally get there, it's going to be a vastly different Europe than the one we might have visited in 1939.

This is precisely what we're going to experience. This pandemic is not going to be over soon. Effective treatments are slowly coming in to place. A vaccine is being desperately researched. I have hope one will be found, but it's not going to be all that soon. Next year, maybe the year after or the year after that. Meanwhile, people are going to get sick and die. Countries will keep their borders closed to others. The global supply line will be permanently disrupted. Things that had been outsourced will return home, It won't matter that those things now cost more money than when they were made overseas. The important thing is that now we can count on getting those things. Health care will be re-thought. So will schools, workplaces, everything.

When all this is finally over the differences will be at least as vast as Europe in 1939 versus Europe in 1946. Maybe even more.