CHINA - under Coronavirus Epidemic: Some Concerned Questions.

Byline: Professor Tang Jun

An unexpected outbreak of novel coronavirus epidemic recently attracted much global attention to China. Coronavirus, a cousin of the SARS virus, was first identified in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, with 27confiremd cases in December. The number of confirmed coronavirus began to surge since mid of January, 2020 in China and thousands of people were infected in and out of the country. What concern the public is the fact that there are 'no known' effective drug /s or any form of vaccines for treating against coronavirus so far.

On January 31st, the World Health Organization declared coronavirus a public health emergency of international concern at a news conference in Geneva, making it the sixth time such an emergency has been declared. Since then, there have been increasing concerns about the epidemic in Chin. Though China has worked in every possible way to limit the damage of the virus and the infection trend, including city lockdown measures, the international community hold different attitudes to China and some countries suspended airlines to China. Christine Lagarde,the president of the European Central Bank has expressed concern that China's coronavirus outbreak is fueling global economic uncertainty: "The short-term uncertainties are mainly related to global risks - trade, geopolitical and now the outbreak of the coronavirus and its potential effect on global growth," CHINA The writer is to discuss some of the most concerned questions on the impact of coronavirus to China.

What impact will it bring to China's economy?

There will be a short-term internal shock to China's economy, but from a long perspective, the impact on the trend of the economy is limited. In terms of macro economy, consumption demand and industry production will declined sharply. Some sectors like investment, consumption, and exports will be terribly affected. In the short run, unemployment and price will rise. The prevention and counter measures against the epidemic will lead to a restricted labor flow, which will bring negative impacts to manufacturing, real estate, and infrastructure investment.China's GDP in the first quarter might drop sharply by 2%-4%.

In industry sectors, the service industry will suffer the worst damage in February and March, with tourism, catering, hotel, and aviation ranking the top. The online retail industry which mostly involves express delivery, online will be greatly affected as well.

The construction...