COVID19 has been more than a flu pandemic, it has turned the world upside down in many ways, it has broken many a paradigma in how humans interact. This affects personal lives, family life, business practices and every social aspect of human interaction.
The fact that wearing a mask has become mandatory in many places, kids growing up and seeing everyone covered up to the eyes. Elders not being able to come close to their loved ones. Knowing that Grandma and Grandpa are fragile and must be taken care of. So many topics to touch and a huge opportunity to apply anthropology to many aspects of life and society. Social studies will have a long way to go and have so much material to dwell upon for the next 10 or 15 years.
Going into the mental field, the isolation, fear, gratefulness and the lack of empathy have all messed with our thoughts. In some societies, China, Ecuador, New York area of the U.S., the extensive lockdown, lack of sunlight or certain foods has definitely had its effect on mental health. The whole situation has changed even the way people eat, voluntarily or not, this in the end does have a chemical reaction on the body and the presence or lack of certain nutrients, minerals and vitamins does cause a reaction that can affect mental health.
This will also have its reaction trascending the human body into society and how economy survives or crashed. An example of all this extrapolates into the travel industry, bringing crashes in large travel companies for example: Thomas Cook, maybe an excuse or the tipping point of a bankruptcy waiting to happen. Smaller companies learning to survive and strive. The U.S. based adventure companies: Expedition Trips - now sells trips in the backdyard of North America, domestic travel, AdventureSmith Explorations is another example now offering adventures in Europe when the main scope used to be Expedition Cruising, another amazing example of resilience is Voyagers Travel where creativity has led to put new
Galapagos tour itineraries on offer. The travel industry without doubt perhaps the big underdog in times of a pandemic, yet those who do come through and weather the storm will end up being stronger and for sure will have developed tools to strive in the aftermath.
On the flipside there is an economic boom in the pharmaceutical industry with the development of vaccines and tests. Beyond this obvious thought come other winners like teleconferencing apps (Zoom, Hangouts, Teams) and delivery services like mentioned above Uber Eats and other similar services. The pandemic has been a hurdle but a catalyst as well. The economy of the world is adaptive and in constant transformation, following laws of energy more than those of logic, where, nothing dissappears but mainly gets transformed into something different, in plain words - wealth changed hands and has reshaped the economic powers. Those who have learned to adapt in a true Darwinian sence of the word will strive and those who do not will sit aside as dinosaurs waiting for extinction to take over.