The spread of Coronavirus around the world will contribute to significant changes in the near future and in the long term in health systems, in cities, in the world of work, in the education system, in public transport, in social relations, in tourism, in society, in the globalization process and the action of governments around the world. The world will no longer be the same. We need to prepare for the future to come. The 11 main changes that will impact the present and the future are presented in this article.

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THE WORLD AFTER CORONAVIRUS
Fernando Alcoforado*
The spread of Coronavirus around the world will contribute to significant changes in the
near and long term in health systems, in cities, in the world of work, in the education
system, in public transport, in social relations, in tourism, in society, in the process of
globalization and in the action of governments around the world. The world will no longer
be the same. We need to prepare for the future to come. The 11 main changes that will
affect the present and the future are described below:
1) Changes in health systems
The Coronavirus pandemic highlighted the fragility of the health infrastructure with
insufficient hospital capacity and health posts and specialized human resources in several
countries around the world. In addition, the inability of medical research institutions to
foresee the emergence of new viruses such as Coronavirus in order to prepare health
systems with new drugs and vaccines for this purpose was also evidenced. Vaccines move
fortunes. Its discovery, however, is not immediate. In the time gap between the spread of
contagion with a new virus and its complete prophylaxis, the consequences can be
devastating. To make matters worse, there is no guarantee that drugs will emerge capable
of immunizing humanity from all diseases caused by viruses. Such uncertainty can
quickly turn into a panic. This is what has been happening with the recent outbreak of the
new Coronavirus (2019-nCoV or Covid-19). In order to change this reality and humanity
not to be surprised by new viruses, as it was now by the Coronavirus, it is necessary to
implement health infrastructures with sufficient capacity in all countries with hospitals
and health posts, as well as invest heavily in research and development aimed at the
manufacture of medicines and vaccines capable of combating current and future viruses.
2) Changes in cities
The world population currently corresponds to 7.7 billion inhabitants and the one that
lives in cities today totals 4 billion inhabitants with the vast majority of them living in
terrible social conditions characterized by high unemployment, existence of populous
slums, tenements and homeless people, lack of adequate basic sanitation, precarious
collection, transportation and final disposal of solid waste, precarious public transport
services, uncontrollable pollution of water, soil and air, the unpreparedness of urban
infrastructure to face floods and the insufficient health infrastructure. The vast majority
of cities in the world are conducive to the large-scale spread of viruses, such as the
Coronavirus, due to the population concentration and the poor health conditions of the
majority of its population. To radically change this reality, it will have to be adopted
worldwide the universal basic income policy for the unemployed and poor living in slums
and tenements and homeless people and massive investment in basic sanitation, in the
collection, transport and final disposal of solid waste, in the public transport
infrastructure, in the urban infrastructure to face floods and in the health infrastructure.
In other words, there needs to be an urban revolution on a global scale to protect city
populations from current and future pandemics.
3) Changes in the world of work

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The world of work has already been greatly impacted by technological advances,
especially by artificial intelligence, with the robotization of productive activity. With the
spread of Coronavirus, there is a tendency for many jobs to be performed by workers in
their homes using the internet and its numerous applications and people do not move to
make purchases of goods and start ordering products and services over the internet and
their numerous applications with suppliers who will deliver them to their homes. The
consequence of all this will be the use of robots to replace workers in industry, commerce
and services, which will result in the exponential growth of unemployment, the
performance of work in their own homes (home working) by some workers and the
delivery of products and services in homes by suppliers (delivery). All of this will impact
the reduction of individual motor vehicles and the demand for public transport in cities,
but will increase the circulation of motorcyclists and drones to deliver products and
services in cities. To mitigate the terrible impact of technological unemployment and that
aggravated by the Coronavirus, it is necessary that governments adopt the policy of social
and solidarity economy and creative economy and the distribution of universal basic
income for the entire population.
4) Changes in the education system
The announcement of the suspension of classes due to the Coronavirus pandemic
(COVID-19) leaves the whole society concerned about the future of students and, of
course, about learning disabilities. Faster than we thought, public managers, civil society
organizations and the community of education professionals offered the first response to
the closure of schools: distance education with the use of digital technologies. The speed
in proposing that technology helps us in school closure scenarios has to do with the
experience of other countries where the pandemic arrived first, such as China, Italy and
South Korea. Face-to-face education is very important, but in situations of pandemic like
the current distance education is absolutely necessary. Education is undoubtedly one of
the most social human experiences. Closing schools and designing an activity plan for
children and teachers at a distance is, therefore, something completely different from
planning face-to-face school activities. One of the main concerns around online classes
has to do with equity and quality of teaching. Distance learning can be used to
complement learning or in emergency situations in elementary, high school, vocational,
youth and adult and special education and higher education. These non-classroom
activities can be officially organized and validated as applied academic content. In order
to adopt this modality, the education networks need to adapt the teaching methodology to
the necessary technological resources. Students must receive adequate and correct
learning. Schools must ensure that students are monitored, evaluated and participate
correctly. Many schools will be much better able to support digital experiences than
others. Technology does not work the same for all age groups. It does not make sense for
online classes for early childhood students that must be held by their families with
guidance for online activities by the school. Digital technology should be used according
to each segment to strengthen the pedagogical work according to the development needs
of each age. Most likely, the Coronavirus crisis will cause distance education to expand
as an alternative to traditional face-to-face education.
5) Changes in public transport
Public transport is a form of transportation existing in medium and large cities. In most

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cities, the main type of vehicle used is the bus, but there are also subways, trains and, in
some cities, ferries, boats, speedboats, among others. If used well, public transport can be
the main solution to urban mobility problems, such as congestion. Recently, the WHO
(World Health Organization) stated that the issue of public transport is also a matter of
public health, since an efficient transport system would decrease the number of cars in
cities, also decreasing the rates of pollution, accidents, physical inactivity, among others.
In the vast majority of countries in the world, public transport conditions are precarious.
The spread of the Coronavirus has highlighted the need for people to be transported seated
by public transport, a fact that makes increasing the capacity of the transport system a
requirement. It is necessary, therefore, that there be a policy of investments in public
transport to increase its capacity, modernize it and guarantee its access to the population,
pluralizing the means of transport beyond the bus, with the installation of vehicles such
as trains, subways and cycle paths. In addition to increasing the capacity of the public
transport system to prevent the spread of new viruses in the future, enabling social
distance with seated passengers, another requirement is the hygiene of public transport
vehicles to safeguard the health of the population.
6) Changes in food production
Coronavirus threatens to cause global food crisis, according to the UN. In a joint
statement, the leaders of three multilateral food, trade and health organizations - FAO,
WTO and WHO - warned of the risk of a food crisis caused by the new Coronavirus
pandemic. There is a risk of “food shortages” on the world market, due to disruptions
derived from COVID-19 in international trade and supply chains. By protecting the health
and well-being of citizens, countries must ensure that all trade measures do not disrupt
the food supply chain, added FAO, WHO and WTO officials. The uncertainties generated
about the availability of food can trigger a wave of restrictions on exports, which, in turn,
would cause its scarcity in the world market. Some grain-exporting countries may retain
their crops for fear of scarcity, while at the other end of the globalized food chain other
more fragile countries are at risk of serious shortages. For the three multilateral
organizations, it is important to guarantee trade, mainly to avoid food shortages,
especially in the poorest countries. The three organizations also highlight the need to
protect workers in the field in order to minimize the spread of the virus in the sector and
maintain food supply chains.
7) Changes in social relations
The current Coronavirus epidemic may not only be making the handshake obsolete, but
also giving birth to new codes and compliments, changing the way we directly relate.
Instead of shaking hands, greetings come in, touching the feet, the elbows, or even just
waving or gesturing in the distance without the hands touching. As the epidemic
advances, in addition to the recommendation to wash your hands for 20 seconds, some
customary and warm habits will have to be avoided. Hands, after all, can carry scraps of
everything we touch between one wash and the other, including the virus. Avoiding
touching one hand has become the recommendation of the World Health Organization,
but we should not lose our good manners and displays of affection and happiness when
meeting someone. For such a global and threatening turmoil as the Coronavirus can leave
deep cultural marks, and even change our notions of etiquette in the future. If individual
relationships are being impeded to fight Coronavirus, there is a greater demand that there
should be no crowds at sporting events, music and cinema, among others. In all
likelihood, there will be a policy of reducing the audience capacity at events in the future,
in addition to cleaning the event venues so as not to spread current and future viruses.

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8) Changes in tourism
The tourism industry promotes a steady flow of people across the globe (and even outside
of it, with space travel captained by Virgin Galactic, by Richard Branson, and SpaceX,
by Elon Musk). Inside or outside the Earth's orbit, tourism generates business
opportunities for both large conglomerates (airlines, hotel chains, cruise lines) as well as
small businesses, whether local travel agencies, inns, restaurants or tour guides who work
in their communities. The tourism sector accounted, in 2018, for 10.4% of all economic
activity on the planet, generating 319 million new jobs (one in five of those created since
2014). The total amount handled by this industry is estimated at US$ 8.8 trillion a year -
almost double the Japanese GDP, which is the fourth in the world (US$ 4.9 trillion in
2018). If it were a country, tourism would be second only to the United States (US$ 20.6
trillion) and China (US$ 11.5 trillion). Coronavirus can cause harm US$ 1 trillion on
global tourism. The current crisis is considered the worst of all time for tourism.
Coronavirus panic leaves cities deserted, empties hotels, forces airlines to cancel routes
and prevents cruise ships from disembarking passengers. Empty hotels, quarantined
cruises. The concern of the hotel sector is great, gaining even greater proportions for
cruise operators. The drama of passengers and crew aboard the ship Diamond Princess,
who were prevented from disembarking at the port of Yokohama, in Japan, ignited the
first warning about the destination of those who are currently traveling at sea. The future
of the global tourism sector depends on success in the fight against Coronavirus and the
recovery of the global economy.
9) Changes in society
Economic and social inequality is a social problem present in all countries of the world.
It stems mainly from the poor distribution of income and the lack of investment in the
social area, such as education and health. Poor distribution of income and concentration
of power, mismanagement of mainly public resources, market logic of the capitalist
system (the more profit for companies and business owners, the better), lack of investment
in social areas, in culture, in assistance to poorer populations, in health and education are
the main causes of economic and social inequality. Coronavirus tends to increase
economic and social inequalities around the world, worsening the social conditions of the
vast majority of the population. Hunger can be rampant in countless countries that do not
adopt policies to support vulnerable populations that can lead to looting and other attacks
in the struggle for their survival. To avoid this scenario, governments need to adopt
policies of social and solidarity economy and creative economy to combat unemployment
and universal basic income to meet the needs of poor populations in order to reduce social
inequalities and mitigate the worsening social conditions of the population. Where
possible, social democracy must be implemented in Scandinavian ways to combat
economic and social inequalities and exercise democracy to the highest degree.
10) Changes in the globalization process
Over the past three decades, economic and financial globalization has been a resounding
success because global GDP has gone from 22 trillion to about 90 trillion dollars. It is
also a fact that the social losses caused by a more globalized world were immense.
Unemployment affects millions of workers worldwide. Globalization was already under
attack by populists, terrorists, commercial warriors and climate activists. Now, the

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Coronavirus has arrived. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development
foresees a 5% to 15% reduction in foreign direct investments in the world in 2020 due to
the Coronavirus. The OECD projects that the global impact of the Coronavirus should
generate a loss of 0.5 to 1.5 percentage points of global GDP. It is a value of 500 billion
to 1.4 trillion dollars in wealth generation that will simply cease to exist. Coronavirus
does not have a passport, it ignores borders, but it also fuels protectionism and
nationalism. The first impact of the new Coronavirus on the global economy was the
shutdown of Chinese industries. From cars to iPhones, the most varied production chains
spread across the planet began to suffer an unexpected shock, caused by the microscopic
organism that escaped from the animal market in the Chinese city of Wuhan. The vision
of the new virus as a “foreign invader” or a “Chinese danger” serves as food for nationalist
ideologies and even pure and simple racism. The pandemic also revealed the risk of
confidence in global production chains and brought protectionism back to life. As the
virus spreads to Europe and the world, it makes China a little more fragile and its
worldwide dependence on it as ‘the factory in the world’ more doubtful. The globalization
of the disease happens with ships and airplanes that spread it very quickly on the planet.
To protect themselves, the immediate impulse of countries is to retreat and raise barriers.
We already see flight numbers dropping dramatically. In a way, this virus highlights the
imbalance in globalization. More than factories returning to their country of origin, we
see companies diversifying the supply chain so that they are no longer as dependent on a
country, like China. In that sense, the Coronavirus can change the course of history. Its
spread can be a turning point in debates about how much the world could integrate or
separate. Even before the virus's arrival in Europe, climate change, security concerns and
complaints about unfair trade had heightened anxieties about global air travel and
globalized industrial supply chains, and reinforced doubts about the reliability of China
as a partner. Along with the number of infected and dead, the economic impact is resized
with each new sign that this crisis is deeper than previously thought. In order to mitigate
the negative impact of Coronavirus on globalization, an international pact must be signed
through the UN and global organizations aimed at rebuilding the world economy on new
bases because the globalization that operated until the advent of Coronavirus has ended.
11) Changes in government action
Governments must act to minimize the number of deaths from Coronavirus by adopting
total social isolation from the population, avoiding the collapse of the health system,
maintaining essential economic activities and adopting measures to benefit the
unemployed and the poor so as not to die of hunger and small and medium-sized
enterprises in order not to succumb to the crisis. These are indispensable measures to be
adopted during the advancement of Coronavirus. In the immediate fight against
Coronavirus, governments must abandon neoliberalism as an economic model
implemented since 1990 and adopt Keynesianism as an economic policy with massive
public investments to avoid hunger for the poor, save companies from the economic
debacle and maintain the operation of the economic system.
The immediate measures to avoid starvation of poor populations during the spread of the
coronavirus are the adoption of a basic income program or universal minimum income
for the population. Giving free money to everyone, that is, a universal minimum income
program would make it possible to alleviate or eliminate poverty. Among the reasons for
this idea to become reality, lies in the fact that distributing money reduces crime,
improves the health of the population and allows everyone to invest in themselves. The

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adoption of the basic income policy or universal minimum income for the poor population
is one of the solutions to alleviate poverty, since it would allow the poor to start having
money to meet their basic needs in terms of food, health, housing, etc. It is important to
note that poverty is the condition of those who are poor, that is, those who do not have
the basic conditions to guarantee their survival with quality of life and dignity. By having
a basic income, the poor population will be able to meet their basic needs. To save
companies from the economic debacle, governments should stop paying taxes and grant
low-interest credit to companies on condition that they keep jobs during the spread of
Coronavirus.
Right after this stage, the government should rationally relax the population's social
isolation by locality according to the stage of the epidemic in which they find themselves
and invest heavily in infrastructure works throughout the national territory to rebuild the
economic system to generate jobs and income for the population, while maintaining
support for the unemployed and the poor to avoid starvation and small and medium-sized
enterprises to survive the crisis. Once the Coronavirus was overcome, the reconstruction
of the national economic system would come with the adoption of the following
measures:
• Construction of a large number of public works, with emphasis on the economic (energy,
transport and communications) and social (education, health, housing and basic
sanitation) infrastructure;
• Development of the social and solidarity economy to combat unemployment;
• Concession of basic or universal income to populations of extreme poverty.
Regarding the Social and Solidarity Economy, it is important to note that it is one of the
solutions to mitigate the problem of unemployment and to open the way to invent in the
future other ways of producing and consuming contributing to greater social cohesion.
The Social and Solidarity Economy is a new model of economic, social, political and
environmental development that has a different way of generating work and income, in
different sectors, be it community banks, credit unions, family farming cooperatives, fair
trade issue, in exchange clubs, etc. The Social and Solidarity Economy constitutes a new
way of organizing work and economic activities in general, emerging as an important
alternative for the inclusion of workers in the labor market, giving them a new opportunity
through self-management. Based on the Social and Solidarity Economy, there is the
possibility of recovering companies in bankruptcy, and to continue them, with a new
mode of production, in which the maximization of profit is no longer the main objective,
giving rise to the maximization of the quantity and the quality of work.
The Social and Solidarity Economy is a possible alternative to generate employment for
workers who are mostly excluded from the formal labor market and consumption. The
Social and Solidarity Economy emerged in various parts of the world with practices of
economic and social relations that are promoting the survival and the improvement of the
quality of life of millions of people. These practices are based on solidary collaborative
relationships, inspired by cultural values that place the human being as the subject and
purpose of economic activity, rather than the private accumulation of wealth in general
and capital in particular. It can be said that the adoption of the Social and Solidarity
Economy is, without a doubt, the solution that would allow facing the mass
unemployment that will grow in the world. In turn, the basic income policy or universal
minimum income for the population is one of the solutions to alleviate poverty.

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* Fernando Alcoforado, 80, awarded the medal of Engineering Merit of the CONFEA / CREA System,
member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor in Territorial Planning and Regional
Development by the University of Barcelona, university professor and consultant in the areas of
strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is author of the
books Globalização (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1997), De Collor a FHC- O Brasil e a Nova (Des)ordem
Mundial (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1998), Um Projeto para o Brasil (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2000), Os
condicionantes do desenvolvimento do Estado da Bahia (Tese de doutorado. Universidade de
Barcelona,http://www.tesisenred.net/handle/10803/1944, 2003), Globalização e Desenvolvimento (Editora
Nobel, São Paulo, 2006), Bahia- Desenvolvimento do Século XVI ao Século XX e Objetivos Estratégicos
na Era Contemporânea (EGBA, Salvador, 2008), The Necessary Conditions of the Economic and Social
Development- The Case of the State of Bahia (VDM Verlag Dr. Müller Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG,
Saarbrücken, Germany, 2010), Aquecimento Global e Catástrofe Planetária (Viena- Editora e Gráfica,
Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2010), Amazônia Sustentável- Para o progresso do Brasil e combate
ao aquecimento global (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2011), Os Fatores
Condicionantes do Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2012), Energia no Mundo
e no Brasil- Energia e Mudança Climática Catastrófica no Século XXI (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2015), As
Grandes Revoluções Científicas, Econômicas e Sociais que Mudaram o Mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba,
2016), A Invenção de um novo Brasil (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2017), Esquerda x Direita e a sua
convergência (Associação Baiana de Imprensa, Salvador, 2018, em co-autoria) and Como inventar o futuro
para mudar o mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2019).