11.The Effect of COVID-19 On The Earth

The effect of COVID-19 on the Earth

VetPubHealth Journal ISSUE 17 IVSA Standing Committe on One Health April 2020 Mariam Ajam IVSA Cyprus COVID-19 is the century’s recent concern. Doctors and scientists all around the world are struggling to contain this virus, and to find an effective vaccine for it. Regardless of the fact that the coronavirus does not kill everyone infected with it, it is a major threat to humanity due to its rapid expansion. The outbreak started in China and rapidly spread throughout many other countries like Italy and Iran. The panic that rose between people around the world and the fast spread of the virus, pushed the governments to take serious measures in this issue. Everyone was shortly aware of the concerns of the spread on the global economy, but only few saw the bigger picture and the effect of the outbreak on the earth. In most countries, including China and Italy, communities were quarantined. All forms of work, manufacturing, education and entertainment were shut. Borders and airports will closed until the governments decide to open them. The use of vehicles for transportation enormously decreased due to the quarantine. In China for example, the daily passenger traffic dropped from 85% at January 10 to 20% at February 17. Moreover the manufacturing purchasing manager’s index decreased from 50.0 to 35.7 from January to February. In addition, china’s export index also dropped from 48.7 to 28.7, same as imports decreased from 49.0 to 31.9. As Ren explains:” The economy experienced huge negative growth in February, the trough has been reached, the duration of the impact should be monitored in the next step.” (Ren, 2020) It was obviously clear to the world that the economy dropped in China and many other countries due to all these interruptions. But the thing that was not visible for the world, is the effect of these interruptions on the earth itself. The earth suffered from all forms of pollution throughout the previous years. Could the effects of COVID-19 actually be beneficial for the health of the earth? Many scientists believe that the problem generated by coronavirus is not exactly a problem to the earth itself. Many scientists see it as a break for the earth from all the pollution caused to it throughout the previous years. Air pollution in the world was mostly caused by the emission of NO2 gas by vehicles, factories and basically all types of machines that burn fossil fuels. Due to the coronavirus outbreak, many factories were shut down or at least decreased the time of their activity. Also as mentioned before the activity of vehicles especially airplanes have dropped in the past two months. In China specifically, which is one of the most important manufacturing countries in the world, the density of NO2 decreased enormously by 25% during the quarantine period, due to the shutting down of many of its factories.Fei said:” This is the first time I have seen such a dramatic dropoff over such a wide area for a specific event.”(Fei, 2020). This change did not only occur in China, but also in countries such as Italy where there was also a pause of the economic and social life. Claus explains:” The decline in nitrogen dioxide emissions over the Po Valley in northern Italy is particularly evident.” (Claus, 2020). Air pollution was not the only thing that decreased, but also water pollution. The lockdown in Italy and the shutting down of the airport, lead to the decrease of tourism in Italy, especially Venice. The canals in Venice that were always full of cruise ships are becoming clearer than ever. One of the scientists have suggested that although there was numbers of 33

deaths caused by coronavirus, but this virus is also saving lives in progress. Marshall suggested:” Given the huge amount of evidence that breathing dirty air contributes heavily to premature mortality, a natural - if admittedly strange - question is whether the lives saved from this reduction in pollution caused by economic disruption from COVID-19 exceeds the death toll from the virus itself.” (Marshall, 2020). “Even under very conservative assumptions, I think the answer is a clear ‘yes’.” It is proven that 2 months of pollution reduction saved 4,000 children under 5, and 73,000 adults over 70 in China. All of these lives saved exceed the number of deaths caused by coronavirus in China. After all, the negative effects of COVID-19 are not deniable, but the benefits of the quarantine are also clearly visible on the earth. Some people see this outbreak as a disaster on humanity, but in fact it is the savor that allowed the earth to have a break from humanmade dilemmas. It is now possible to say that the lockdown of humans from the earth’s resources is giving the earth a chance to renew itself without our help. And even though the lockdown will shortly be over as the coronavirus starts to fade, but this short period of rest for nature is enough for it to heal itself and keep giving us, humans, what we might not deserve. 1.Zeping, Ren. (February 2020). Coronavirus: China’s factory activity plunges to all-time low, worse than global financial crisis, February data show. Publisher: Andrew Mullen and Orange Wang https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/ article/3052985/coronavirus-chinas-factories-activity-plunges-all-time-low 2. Zehner, Claus. (2020). Air pollution has fallen in northern Italy following lockdown https://airqualitynews.com/2020/03/16/air-pollution-has-fallen-in-northern-italy-following-lockdown/ 3. Burke, Marshall. (March 2020). New Evidence Shows How COVID-19 Has Affected Global Air Pollution. Publisher: Jacinta Bowler. https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-what-covid-19-is-doing-to-ourpollution-levels 4. Lin, Fei.(2020). NASA says COVID-19 lockdown ‘slashes air pollution’ in China. Publisher:Jonny Bairstow https://www.energylivenews.com/2020/03/17/ nasa-says-covid-19-lockdown-slashes-air-pollutionin-china/ 34 References: