If 2020 was a year where our civilisation was on the defensive against the pandemic, 2021 is the year that humanity goes on the offensive.
The US is now hitting 1.6 million vaccine shots per day, and 11% of its population has received at least one dose. Numbers of hospitalisations with serious illness remain dire, but these metrics too are starting to inflect and show indications of moving down consistently. The UK has now administered at least one shot to 20% of its population and it is seeing considerable declines in hospitalisations. China (40.5 million doses administered) and India (7 million doses administered) are starting to ramp up their vaccination campaigns and are now number two and number four globally in terms of total vaccines administered.
It is worth remembering that 10 weeks ago, nobody outside of a clinical trial had received a single vaccine dose anywhere on Earth.
Genetic sequencing technology is now allowing us to track the mutation of the virus around the world and updated vaccines could be ready within months. We may even soon be able to utilise artificial intelligence and modern computing power to predict virus mutations before they occur, potentially having the next generation of vaccines ready before they are needed. Even 20 years ago this would have been impossible.
Trials are underway for self-administered pill-based vaccines (no injection required), radically reducing the cost and increasing the speed to vaccinate populations. Research is also at an advanced stage on vaccines that could target all coronaviruses, not just COVID-19, raising the prospect of a world with zero human transmission of all coronavirus types.
Although there is a long way to go, significant progress has been made and this progress is accelerating. There may be more bad news to come, and investors should be ready to weather the associated volatility we may see in markets in the event of unexpected setbacks. But nonetheless, it is clear that the tide has turned and the route out of the pandemic and towards an unconstrained economic recovery is becoming clearer.
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