If truth is the first casualty of war, then the Covid-19 pandemic shows every sign of being one. Three months since the first reported case, reliable information is becoming as rare as toilet paper, face masks and a busy Chinese restaurant.
The other parallel is more sobering. As far as we know, the virus’s mortality rate is about 3 percent. That’s about the same percentage of the world’s population that died in World War 2. There are differences, of course. It’s almost impossible that everyone on the planet will catch the disease and that no cure will be found. And while the WW2 losses were mostly among the young and fighting fit, the average age of death due to Covid-19 so far is 80.
So far, so grim.
But let’s look forward – maybe 9 months, maybe a couple of years – to when Covid-19 is under control and just another reason to wash your hands and believe in vaccines.
What could be the lasting effects of a pandemic on the way we do business and live our lives?
Looking back over the last century or so, the other thing global wars had in common (and we’ll count the Cold War and its sexy cousin the Space Race here) is that they all drove innovation. Technology and society advance far more rapidly in times of global crisis than they do in peacetime. When it’s do or die, we choose do.
If we’re lucky, the Covid-19 pandemic could have much the same effect. Tragically, many people will die. But, as we always have, we’ll innovate and adapt, and many of the changes we make will stick.
Travel
Ironically, the global air travel market was made possible by a global crisis. World War 2 accelerated innovation in aircraft size, speed and range and left us with the planes, pilots and long runways that cheap world travel needed. Covid-19 could well wind back the clock.
Targeted travel restrictions were among the first actions governments took to control the spread of infection. Businesses and sporting bodies have followed, imposing severe restrictions on international travel. The environmentally-driven #nofly movement was already gaining momentum pre-virus.
In a world with less business travel, organisations will lean more and more on video conferencing, email and just plain old phone calls to connect. Travel will bounce back post-virus, but by then we will have become familiar with new ways of working… so it’s unlikely business travel will return to anything like the same level.
How we connect
If there’s one thing a virus likes, it’s a room full of people from all over the world, shaking hands. Conferences large and small are being canned, including Barcelona’s Mobile World Congress and just this week Austin Texas’s tech/film/music megaconference South By South West. On the business front, a year of cancelled events will likely force companies to find new ways to communicate, learn and sell, and many of these will stick once the pandemic passes.
Gatherings for entertainment – concerts, movies, festivals and so on – are more likely to recover. Like Marie Kondo’s half empty sock drawer, they spark joy – and we’re always going to want that.
How we work
Technology companies – telcos in particular – have been predicting we’d be working from home for years. Until now, though, it just hasn’t happened. The number of Kiwis working from home reached about 10% a decade ago and hasn’t grown much since then, possibly due to the social appeal of spending time in a workplace outweighing the benefits of a 30-second commute and Skyping in your undies.
Today, the technology to support remote working is accessible to almost any business. Fibre connectivity and fast mobile internet mean workers can remain constantly connected from anywhere. Free or cheap cloud-based services like Google Drive or Dropbox remove the need to physically connect to an office server. And communications platforms like Skype, Zoom, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger make it as easy to send a cat video across the planet as it is to send one across the office.
That 10% working from home number? Expect it to go up and stay up.
How we commute
Not everyone can work from home. So how will the way we get to work and school change in the face of a pandemic? One unfortunate and likely effect will be people avoiding public transport. So we can expect a rise in private vehicle use, with lower fuel prices making this even more probable.
On the upside, for those who can make it work, commuting by cycling or walking is likely to increase. Hopefully this habit will stick.
How we shop
Online shopping – especially groceries and ready-to-eat meals – is already booming. My Food Bag is already New Zealand’s third biggest food retailer. Uber Eats drivers outnumber customers in many restaurants. In China, home food delivery businesses are reportedly flat out. If the pandemic leads to people avoiding trips outside the home, it’s likely this will accelerate.
As the home food delivery market grows, so will the logistics back end needed to support it. Greater scale, coupled with lower fuel costs, will help make delivery more affordable and accessible. Once home delivery becomes a habit, it’s likely to continue post-pandemic too.
Three months in, it's not clear whether Covid-19 will become this generation’s World War 2 or just another skirmish in the endless battle against disease. Either way, we will adapt, change and innovate, just as we always have in the face of global threats. While the challenges are ahead of us aren’t clear, I reckon we can find the confidence to face them by looking to history.
Kia whakatōmuri te haere whakamua: “I walk backwards into the future with my eyes fixed on my past.”