On Friday, the status of Nigeria as a country free from coronavirus changed as one person was confirmed positive in Lagos. An Italian who works in Nigeria, got into the country via Turkish Airline on the 25th of February, he suddenly fell ill while in Ogun State. He was taken to a hospital where diagnosis confirmed him positive, and that was the beginning of the Nigerian story in the list of countries battling to contain the deadly virus.

As expected, the development has thrown the public into fear and panic, and there is a load of misinformation to keep it going. The Nigerian Center for Disease Control (NCDC) has issued a statement urging the public to remain calm as the situation is being contained.

“The Government of Nigeria, through the Federal Ministry of Health has been strengthening measures to ensure an outbreak in Nigeria is controlled and contained quickly.

“The multi-sectoral Coronavirus preparedness Group led by the Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC) has immediately activated its national Emergency Operations Center and will work closely with Lagos State Health authorities to respond to this case and implement firm control measures.

“We wish to assure all Nigerians that we will be beefing up our preparedness capabilities since the first confirmation of cases in China, and we will use all the resources made available by the government to respond to this case,” statement from NCDC said on Friday.

This assurance is meant to bring calm among Lagosians and Nigerians in general, if not for the fact that the infected person has made contact with several other people in Lagos and Ogun States, who cannot be accounted for. Though the NCDC said his activities since he came into Lagos are being tracked, and probably, it is going to lead to people who have had contact with him, there is no doubt that the virus is already spreading.

A report by Sahara Reporters said the Italian went to the Lafarge Factory at Ewekoro Ogun State, and made contacts with so many people before it became obvious he needed medical attention. He was taken to the Lafarge clinic where medical personnel attended to him without protective gear.

To confirm the fear being entertained by many, the Italian was driven to Lagos using an ambulance belonging to a clinic in Shagamu, which is not designated for coronavirus emergencies. Moreover, the driver was wearing no protective gear when he drove the patient to Lagos, and he was not given medical checks to ascertain his status. So he went back the way he came.

Though the report said the Lafarge clinic has been shut down and many of those (about 28 persons) who came in contact with the Italian (including the ambulance driver) have been quarantined, they all have made contacts with others as well. An eyewitness said that on the day of the event, “they were all allowed to go home.”

A Twitter user claimed he came in contact with the Italian, he tweeted that he picked him from the Murtala Mohammed Airport Lagos and spent enough time with him to be concerned about being infected.

https://twitter.com/boldjohnson07/status/1233317328558923776?s=19

In his next tweet, he confirmed that he has tested positive.

The Impact so far

As the stories emerge, they come with panic reactions that are capable of disrupting economic activities in the state. Already, COVID-19 has left terrible economic prints everywhere it has passed around the world. Over $5 trillion has been wiped off markets, and stocks are still counting losses. The European stock markets today recorded further losses as stocks keep plunging to dismal levels. Germany’s DAX failed by over 4%, France’s CAC 40 by 3.8%, the UK’s FTSE 100 went down by 3.5% and Spain’s IBEX 35 was down by 4%.

In Lagos, at the break of the news people were thrown into panic buying medical supplies. Sanitizer went from N2,200 to N3,200, and many of the supermarkets are reportedly running out of supplies. This is certainly going to affect how people move, interact, or engage in all businesses in the state. And the economic effect is going to be much.

It is of concern because it is happening at a time when the oil sector is suffering a severe downturn as a result of the scourge. And the non-oil sector is showing an increase according to the Q4 2019 report. So if it is not curtailed quickly, many of the businesses in the non-oil sector are going dwindle as people would likely keep to themselves.

In this state of chaos, the government has been urged to be pragmatic in order to put the people to calm. The former vice president Atiku Abubakar has urged the federal government to apply the same method that Nigeria used in 2014 to defeat Ebola in their approach. He also counseled the government to stop flights from infected countries.

“We must call upon our experience with the Wild Ebola Virus, of which we were the first nation in the world to defeat that scourge in 2014. How did Nigeria do it? We achieved it by showing unprecedented unity…

“Nigeria needs firm and decisive actions to prevent an escalation of the scourge. Recently, we closed our borders as an act against economic sabotage. Perhaps now is the time to temporarily halt flights to and from any nation with a prevalence of this scourge,” he said.

Coronavirus is spreading at such a rate that it seems like a death sentence, so far, there has been over 82,594 reported cases globally, there has also been 36, 571 recoveries.

The general public has been urged to keep a hygienic attitude and look out for the symptoms which basically are; cough, sneezing, fever, breathlessness, rigors and chest pain.

The economic impact of COVID-19 has sailed through the shores of almost every country in the world, wreaking unprecedented havoc on markets globally. Over 6 trillion has reportedly vanished from stocks around  the world, creating an horror of uncertain future for the world economy. The World Health Organization (WHO), said the world should brace up for more cases as the disease keeps spreading to new countries in minutes.

There have been over 85,000 cases and counting, with the largest economies in the world (US and China), taking a big fall, and there is yet little hope for its containment. There have been over four new cases of the virus in the US in the last 24 hours, raising the alarm for a possible spread in the world leading economy which will do more harm to the already wrecked world economy.

California announced a second possible instance of community spread, Oregon and Washington States are on the radar also. As experts try to find a cure, the virus pushes through the walls of defense, crushing humans and businesses. Not even digital currency is spared. Bitcoin is down more than 10% since early this week, below $8,700 and far from its 2020 high of around $10,450 on Feb. 12. Now bitcoin is up only 22% for the year, after it had been up close to 50% just two weeks ago.

The other big wings in the cryptocurrency space are not spared either, among the three largest market-cap coins after bitcoin, either (ETH-USD) is down 15% in the past five days, ripple (XRP-USD) is down 14%, and bitcoin cash (BCH-USD) is down 17%. The turn of events in the digital currency market has prompted people to question if bitcoin is really a safe haven from economic crisis. The answer so far has been yes and no, especially when gold appears to be immune to the dwindling economic impacts stemming from coronavirus.

The fact that BTC could not rally in the face of the advance by Gold prices and drop in equities was a "tell" pic.twitter.com/GpCiXjB5cD

— Peter Brandt (@PeterLBrandt) February 26, 2020

Frank Chapparo of Bitcoin news site, The Block said it is nascent and volatile: “This is still a very nascent, volatile asset class. If I’m an investor and I want predictability in my portfolio, I’m not going to be outsized allocating to bitcoin and other digital assets. Now, that doesn’t mean that this narrative of bitcoin being a hedge against global economic insecurity or political insecurity [is wrong]. That’s still something that could play out over the next ten, fifteen, twenty years,”he said.

One conclusion that many have come to terms with is that COVID-19 is such a powerful force that Bitcoin would totally resist it. The digital currency economy could not be immune to a virus taking such a crushing ride on the global economy. However, it offers uncommon hope to investors against global insecurity in the long run, even though the accurate predictability of the future outcome is not guaranteed.

BitGo co-founder, Ben Davenport provided an answer to the question of “Bitcoin’s haven” status that is neither here nor there. When the question was put out by Bloomberg Crypto on Twitter. Davenport responded, saying it’s neither a risk-on nor a risk-off asset right now.

Bitcoin is neither a risk-on nor a risk-off asset at this point. It still marches to the best of its own drum. The actions of whales and leveraged traders are far more meaningful than any macro concerns. https://t.co/i91iLajV6w

— Ben Davenport (@bendavenport) February 26, 2020

As the COVID-19 onslaught continues, some of the biggest and most prominent bitcoin bulls are still bullish on the “safe haven” theory. Tyler Winklevoss on Wednesday night, as the price of bitcoin was sinking, tweeted: “At some point people will wake up and realize that bitcoin is the best safe haven asset the world has ever seen. Until then, opportunity abounds.”

Yes, “opportunity abounds” because compared with stock markets around the world, Bitcoin still offers security in times of economic crisis, though proving exactly not true to the “safe haven” narrative. It breeds concern to investors because, as a digital alternative to fiat, the coronavirus crisis is expected to be a boost to cryptocurrency.

The crunching crisis has however, failed to spur growth in the digital currency industry, putting the audacity of bitcoin and the others into serious questions. Bitcoin is often called “digital gold,” a phrase which is supposed to represent its resistance to conventional economic crisis, its failure to live up to that in the face of coronavirus scourge has cast doubts on the “safe haven” theory.

He is an eminent Blockchain Engineer in one of Canada’s top digital security companies. He builds technologies that help secure precious assets around the world. He is a master of the interface between business growth and innovation through the nexus of industry-shaping technology called blockchain. You can not really write of blockchain in Africa without him because he founded one of the earliest startups in the space here even as the beautiful Canada shows love. Uchi will take us into an excursion into blockchain and how that technology can help us create leverageable positioning on markets. The videos and materials go live 12 noon Lagos time, on Monday, at the Tekedia Mini-MBA digital board.

https://www.tekedia.com/dboard/

She is an IT leader in one of the nation’s leading reinsurance corporations. And because IT does not just run modern organizations but also transform them, she is an agent of business transformation. On Monday, Toyin will lead us into the mechanics of business growth and disruptive innovation via artificial intelligence. I just finished watching the amazing videos. As a professional in this fledgling industry, members will see the stakes here and the reason why we cannot just relax; AI will change the ordinances in markets and as Toyin noted, being AI-ready is the future. It goes live 12 noon Lagos time, on Monday at the Tekedia Mini-MBA digital board.

https://www.tekedia.com/dboard/