Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, an estimated 2.5 million adults and children died from pneumonia each year. The cost of not investing the resources needed to fight pneumonia will be measured in millions of lives lost every year and millions more every time a new pandemic strikes.
NEW YORK – COVID-19 has exposed the limited ability of health systems around the world to cope with a pandemic of respiratory infection. With the official death count from COVID-19 now over five million, and the unofficial count estimated at up to five times higher, the struggles of health systems everywhere have been evident to all.
What is less clear is how the world could have been so blindsided by COVID-19. Respiratory diseases have long been the leading infectious cause of death globally. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, an estimated 2.5 million adults and children died from pneumonia each year. No other infection causes anywhere near this number of fatalities.
And pneumonia deaths occur in all countries. In high-income countries, deaths are concentrated among older adults, while in low-income countries, children are the primary victims. Many middle-income countries struggle with large numbers of deaths among both groups.
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From semiconductors to electric vehicles, governments are identifying the strategic industries of the future and intervening to support them – abandoning decades of neoliberal orthodoxy in the process. Are industrial policies the key to tackling twenty-first-century economic challenges or a recipe for market distortions and lower efficiency?
From breakthroughs in behavioral economics to mounting evidence in the real world, there is good reason to think that the economic orthodoxy of the past 50 years now has one foot in the grave. The question is whether the mainstream economics profession has gotten the memo.
looks back on 50 years of neoclassical economic orthodoxy and the damage it has wrought.
For decades, US policymakers have preferred piecemeal tactical actions, while the Chinese government has consistently taken a more strategic approach. This mismatch is the reason why Huawei, to the shock of sanctions-focused American officials, was able to make a processor breakthrough in its flagship smartphone.
warns that short-termism will never be enough to offset the long-term benefits of strategic thinking.
NEW YORK – COVID-19 has exposed the limited ability of health systems around the world to cope with a pandemic of respiratory infection. With the official death count from COVID-19 now over five million, and the unofficial count estimated at up to five times higher, the struggles of health systems everywhere have been evident to all.
What is less clear is how the world could have been so blindsided by COVID-19. Respiratory diseases have long been the leading infectious cause of death globally. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, an estimated 2.5 million adults and children died from pneumonia each year. No other infection causes anywhere near this number of fatalities.
And pneumonia deaths occur in all countries. In high-income countries, deaths are concentrated among older adults, while in low-income countries, children are the primary victims. Many middle-income countries struggle with large numbers of deaths among both groups.
To continue reading, register now.
Subscribe now for unlimited access to everything PS has to offer.
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