U.S. May Face 18 Months of Rolling Shutdowns

Desh Kapoor -

Corona Virus has locked down most of the countries in the world.  And everybody seems to have his/her own expert opinion – as was the case with Fareed Zakaria this week in GPS.  Now, Fed Minneapolis President, Neel Kashkari suggests that in absence of a real vaccine for the problem, virus doesn’t really ‘go away’.

Without an effective therapy or a vaccine for the novel coronavirus, the U.S. economy could face 18 months of rolling shutdowns as the outbreak recedes and flares up again, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis President Neel Kashkari said.“We’re looking around the world. As they relax the economic controls, the virus flares back up again,” Kashkari said Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” Kashkari is a voter in 2020 on the Fed’s policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee. (Source: Kashkari Says U.S. May Face 18 Months of Rolling Shutdowns)

In fact in most places, we are seeing that the virus infections rise again once the controls are lifted.  For example, in China, the infections have shot up this week once again.

On Sunday China’s national health commission reported 108 new infections, the highest number in more than five weeks, surpassing Saturday’s 99, which was nearly double the 46 reported on Friday. (Source: Guardian)

This is a pretty scary situation where it seems as of now:

  1. No one has any idea of how to fight and close on the virus infections
  2. No one knows what is the right path to opening the economy

Without the vaccine and drug to fight the COVID-19, we may be looking at prolonged pain with a never ending cyclical situation.  The current situation in USA itself is very scary with Corona, but with Rolling Shutdown we could be looking at even more dangerous scenario.