The coronavirus sweeping the globe will change our lifestyle practices. Some changes will be swift, some gradual.
A new worry about hygiene and public health will come swiftly and increase the use of alcohol-based sanitizers. Political campaign promises might extend to providing hand sanitizers in every room, on every street corner.
The practice of distancing to avoid infection has already seen thousands of people being asked to work from home — a practice that could become much more common after coronavirus is beaten.
An estimated 1.7 million Canadians already work from their homes, with eight million Americans doing the same.
The implications of a gradual and partial shift of employees to home work from the work place are immense. Less real estate will be needed and less energy will be used to heat and cool all that real estate.
Society will begin turning back the clock by 250 years to the pre-Industrial Revolution era when the home was the most common place of work, then replaced by factories with dehumanizing machines.
This shift has the opportunity to improve the quality of family life. More family presence in the home and time to play, even partake of meals together, could change lifestyles and family togetherness.
The restaurant industry could suffer as people choose to stay at home and cook at home. Certainly all the workers at home will cut into the lunch hour business.
On the food scene, a larger stay-at-home population could ingrain general acceptance of the booming $1.5 billion annual meal kit delivery industry.
Out-of-home day care centres could sustain loss of clients as more parents are home to care for their children.
The entertainment business faces revolutionary changes from fewer live concert events, even greater use of online media to use of movie theatres to simulate live concerts.
Shopping habits, already experiencing significant shifts to online purchases and home delivery, will only grow online buying.
Staying at home and spending less on outside items could result in a decrease to the overwhelmingly high consumer debt.
Proposals by government to send cheques to persons left without income due to coronavirus present an experiment in guaranteed income.
Once governments start printing money to replace lost income the temptation to continue on an intermittent or permanent basis will be overwhelming.
The most significant impact from coronavirus could be on the environment.
Fewer workers in offices will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and pollution from transportation and cut highway congestion.
Twice now, the world has witnessed sudden reduction in pollution from measures taken to stem the sweep of coronavirus
Just a week after the closure of the Wuhan region in China, satellite maps clearly showed pollution had practically disappeared.
Days after northern Italy was closed, the same reduction in pollution over that region was noticed.
The incidence of coronavirus has shown the world how pollution and climate change can be tackled, how a truly sustainable world would work.
The cost of tackling pollution in this manner, higher rates of unemployment during the shift, low growth or no growth economies, may be too high for political leaders and the public to accept.
A sustainable economy under these conditions would require a change of lifestyle from producing and consuming/accumulating ever more stuff to providing just the basics we need to live.
The opportunity is there. Is the price too high?
Ron Walter can be reached at ronjoy@sasktel.net
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the position of this publication.
