Linguofreak
Well-known member
Yes I think its unreasonable to hope a vaccine to be available before 1 or 2 years. And yes that's very long.
In France, the restaurant industry is slowly dying. In other places too, but in France well... its a symbol. Of course the state is helping a lot but the future remains very dark : social distancing is IMHO incompatible with the mere concept of the "small french restaurant" which is what attract people. Also those restaurants typically have one small room, make little margin and they simply won't be profitable with an half-empty room (and more likely three-quarters empty). Also summer is obviously the time of the year where they make profit, and it is now more and more obvious that tourism will be extremely reduced. International tourism will be almost non-existent, and even within the country there will be restrictions. Add to that that most people won't be in a mood to go out and spend money. So yes it really looks grim. Will the state be able to support the industry for 1 or 2 years ? If yes, the cost will be enormous, if not the cost will also be very high as a significant part of the economy will just stop to exist and unemployment will skyrocket. :shrug:
We may well not have a vaccine or cure within a year or two, but I'm very skeptical that social distancing measures will remain in place for that long. I figure around July or August, if full lockdown measures are still in place, we'll be on the verge of the economy breaking in ways that have a significant cost in lives, and at that point either society will back down and take the excess disease casualties, or things actually will break and at that point governments will be dealing with so many crises that they will no longer be able to enforce quarantine.
But if asymptomatic rates are really as high as some studies are indicating, then we'll probably hit the herd immunity point well before then, and lockdowns will likely have been relaxed.