Five years since covid: how the pandemic changed the world
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. In December 2019, a cluster of cases with an unknown flu-like illness emerged in Wuhan, China. Within a few weeks, the virus spread across the region, and soon engulfed the world.
By March 2020, covid-19 had been declared a pandemic. The years 2020 and 2021 saw millions of dead, soaring unemployment, economic recession, and severe hardship in countries all over the world. Half a decade has passed since the worst global economic, social and health crisis in a century.
But the economic, social and policy effects are still lingering, and have changed the world in significant ways. India’s growth seems to have rebounded, but the data masks the fact that the stumble of 2020-21 set us back several years from the pre-covid output path. Between 2011-12 and 2019-20, the Indian economy averaged an annual growth rate of 6.6%.
In 2020-21, it plunged to 5.8% as stringent lockdowns were imposed. As the pandemic receded, the economy recovered: the following three years saw growth rates of 9.7%, 7% and 8.2%, respectively. Also Read: RBI’s GDP projections on test as India’s Q2 GDP growth falls short However, India’s GDP will catch up with its pre-covid trend path only by 2042-43, assuming a steady 7% growth from 2024-25.
A higher, 7.5%, growth rate will allow the catch-up a decade earlier. Such output gaps also exist for other large economies that appear to have turned around (the US, China). Each will need robust growth to return to their pre-pandemic paths, but unfortunately, external challenges such as trade tensions will make it harder to achieve this goal.
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