Coronavirus Chronicles in Moldova: Is the Epidemic Peaking?

Marina DRAGALIN In early March, President Igor Dodon announced the state’s readiness for four development of the situation with the coronavirus scenarios. The last and most critical, supposed more than a thousand cases identification. Moldova confidently overcame this threshold this week Negative dynamics Despite the situation stabilization in China, the new infection’s homeland, the rest of the world continues to submit to the virus. The number of infected has exceeded 1.5 million people, and the number of victims is rapidly approaching the hundred thousandth mark. The situation with COVID-19 in Moldova, unfortunately, is developing in the spirit of global trends. There are already 1289 cases of infection in the country, 29 of which have been fatal. Statistics is inexorable: the virus continues to rapidly conquer our republic. For several weeks, the disease has maintained extremely high rates of spread - the number of officially confirmed cases in the country is growing almost 3 times a week. The dynamics of mortality is worsening. If last Friday we wrote about 6 fatal cases, today they are almost five times more - 29. Using mathematical models developed by experts on the basis of dynamics of the situation study in other countries, we can say that the number of real cases of infection with the new coronavirus ranges from 23 to 100 thousand. The forecasts of the World Health Organization about the increase in number of cases of the new coronavirus infection in Moldova to 28 thousand people today does not seem that pessimistic. We have to admit that, despite all the quarantine measures, the epidemic was not fully controlled. The virus has penetrated almost all areas of the country. Given the number of charter flights from Europe agreed upon by the Commission for Emergency Situations for this and next week, in addition to internal transmission of the virus, imported cases will again press on statistics. As we wrote earlier, the peak incidence is still to come. One can only hope that will be possible to stretch in time the surge, thus, reducing its severity. However even the time, is unfortunately working against Moldova. The country has already set a world anti-record in medical worker’s infection sharing one to another: now they are almost 30% - 348. If the current rate of medical personnel contamination continues, in a month there will simply remain no one to treat patients. The load on the system is daily growing and the staff has no time to a normal recover. Everything has a tensile strength, including that of paramedics who give all their best at the coronavirus front line. It must be understood that the problem of personnel in this entire story is one of the key. Moldovan authorities urgently need to find a solution. In the end, we can remind the Chinese ambassador, Mr. Zhang Inhong, about the shipment of masks that the Moldovan government bought and handed over to China in February and ask experienced Chinese specialists to be sent to us a response gesture. Authorities actions: inconsistency and political intrigues Anyway, it is worth easing the life of those doctors who are still in service. For example, spending money from accounts opened by the Ministry of Finance to combat coronavirus. According to the latest data, more than 13 million lei have already been collected there and not even one of which has yet been disbursed. A thrift that causes questions. “And this is at the time when we receive desperate calls from doctors from all over the country every day to help them sending remedies, because the situation is becoming unbearable,” the situation outraged MP Radu Marian. The state, of course, made an attempt to fulfill the request of the union to provide medical personnel with protective equipment. A contract was concluded with Lismedfarm SRL for 36 million lei for the supply of protective screens and respirators with filter from China. The load, however, was lost. In the truest sense of the word. For five days they could not find it. As a result of an almost detective story, it turned out that the equipment had not yet left China. So, the authorities decided not to rely on carriers and independently organize a cargo charter next week. Against the general background, it is not even surprising that the company Lismedfarm SRL was the only one that submitted documents for the tender of the Center for centralized public procurement in healthcare. However, it is more disturbing that, due to political games, almost all measures to support the population and business have been suspended. The Constitutional Court examined the complaints of the deputies of the factions of PAS, Platform DA, the Pro Moldova group and the independent deputy Alexandru Oleinic regarding the bills and the number of measures adopted during the state of emergency, and suspended the law for which the government took responsibility in the fight against COVID- 19. According to Prime Minister Ion Chicu the result is that the government cannot pay unemployment benefits in the amount of 2775 lei, the increased minimum monthly income and child allowance, cannot reimburse economic agents 42-45% of the salary fund and solve the situation with patents for 8 thousand people cannot reduce the VAT rate for HoReCa and postpone the payment of local tax for economic agents. Given that Moldovan society generally does not have financial savings, the support measures abolition will seriously affect the population, moreover, the most vulnerable groups and will give additional acceleration to crisis processes. The country's economy is already facing difficult times. The state has already lost 40% of its income due to the cessation of taxes and fees. According to the economist of the independent analytical center Expert-Grup Dumitru Punta, "negative consequences for the economy will be provoked not only by internal but also external factors." “There will be economic problems with the main trading partners of Moldova, including Romania, Germany, Italy, Turkey and Russia. Also, the source of negative consequences could be a reduction in money transfers from abroad due to Moldovan migrants return from the countries of the European Union, Russia and Israel,” the economist emphasizes. Against the background of general hopelessness, certain optimism causes the intention of the European Union to allocate 20 billion euros for pandemic and its consequences combatting. Moldova, as a neighboring country of the EU and a member of the Eastern Partnership, will get 87 million out of this amount. Here, of course, the traditional question of the effectiveness of foreign aid development arises. And the creation of a certain Center for the Coordination of Foreign Aid to eliminate the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic in this context looks like just another tool for distributing cash flows into the right pockets. One would like to believe that the current crisis will indeed become an impetus for the Moldovan authorities to fundamentally change their attitude towards the goals and objectives of being part of the government. Unfortunately, by now the actions of the Moldavian establishment remain in the old logic of the unstoppable political struggle and that once again proved the latest decision of the Constitutional Court. However, the coming incidence rate peak and the accompanying it economic crisis and social tension should nevertheless force the Moldovan authorities to move to more reasonable and balanced measures. Otherwise, when the viral wave subsides, they might not have a country left to rule.