Make Sense of the world
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Given the shortage of testing kits for COVID-19 around the world, the current testing regimen includes primarily (if not exclusively) symptomatic patients, making the rate of death appear to be worse than it might actually be. According to the US Centers for Disease Control, asymptomatic persons...
The topic of nearly every conversation right now is centered around COVID-19, and rightfully so. The recently announced coronavirus pandemic is already changing life as we know it, and for many people, life will take an even stranger turn over the next few weeks, months and maybe even years....
Last week, I looked at some real economy and financial channels that the coronavirus pandemic has disrupted across the world. A global recession is now a foregone conclusion, and it will have emanated from the harsh impact on the economy. On the one hand is the supply side, with production...
*Author’s note: This article was written on March 13, 2020. Some issues and data may have changed since then. I am writing this column in a state of a latent denial. Having worked from home for much of the past week, I’ve been trying to juggle work duties with kid’s entertainment as...
As the civil war in Syria moves toward an end, it becomes ever more difficult to postpone resolution of the toughest issues. Each actor has different priorities, which are not easy to reconcile. The Syrian regime wants to regain full control of its territory, while Russia and Iran are particularly...
America has been living on hubris and borrowed time, mired in an orgy of debt, delusion and dogma. Its stock traders have, for a decade now, chosen to believe that events which ordinarily would have resulted in losses are in fact causes for celebration in a marketplace that has defied logic and...
At a time when commodity markets are slowing down, when China and the United States are quarreling to reshape global supply chains to their benefit, with climate change adversely affecting emerging markets and the coronavirus outbreak threatening business continuity worldwide, Latin American...
China’s economic juggernaut has been brought to its knees by COVID-19. In the first two months of this year, Beijing reported a 17% drop in exports, including a 28% drop in exports to the US, a 4% drop in imports, and trade deficit of $7.1 billion. For the Chinese government to publish such...
I’ve changed my mind. Loneliness isn’t so much an epidemic as an anti-epidemic. Just now, COVID-19, a regular coronavirus, is spreading like a regular epidemic. So far only tens of thousands are affected, not tens of millions, but already public health is a top priority. Stopping viral...
On February 28, Turkey opened its borders with the European Union in the wake of the death of 34 Turkish soldiers in Syria. In response, Greece and Bulgaria stepped their border protections, insisting that they would not admit any Syrian refugees fleeing the civil war. In the meantime, the EU...
According to current estimates, more than 3 billion people worldwide are routine users of social media. And if you’re one of those billions, then you know good and well that social media is used for far more than posting cat videos or wishing happy birthday to your long-lost college...
