Economy 13 March 2020, 5:11pm

Coronavirus pandemic: Hungary will have no second chance

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Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has made a surprising statement in a radio interview on Friday morning. He said that if schools were closed in an attempt to control the spread of the coronavirus, teachers would need to go on unpaid leave and students would have to retake the current academic year. It is evident that the government is extremely reluctant to shut down institutions of public education and care, while the coronavirus is already in the country. The cabinet has to balance on an extremely narrow fence, but one thing is certain: no country will be given a second chance.

Orbán's remarks revealed today that he would send teachers on unpaid leave if the cabinet decided to close schools. Moreover, he argues that it would be such a drastic interruption that the whole academic year had to be repeated. Although the latter statement is not new, as the head of the PM's Office Gergely Gulyás has already shared this view earlier this week, Orbán delivered bad news to teachers and students at once, i.e. with public servants who work for the state and with young people for whom education is compulsory.

None of these groups have a choice, they must do what the government dictates. If the school is open, they must go.

However, there are reports that an increasing number of parents defy the current rules and refuse to let their child/children go to school. A petition keeps popping up on Facebook, in which parents are demanding the cabinet to close schools. It has been signed by about 20,000 parents so far.

Teachers do have a choice, at least in the long run. If their employer sends them home without pay, a lot of them will have no choice but to change careers. You have to make ends meet somehow.

The point is that education organisations claim a general closure of schools would not necessitate the repetition of the current academic year. First of all, this would be a temporary closure and as such it may be managed flexibly. Experts have come up with various recommendations to make up for the days (weeks) lost. One of them is to make Saturdays school days. Another is to hold more classes a day than the legal maximum for a while.

A host of countries in Europe have already decided on a two-week suspension of care kindergartens, teaching schools, colleges, and universities. All this in a bid to prevent the coronavirus from spreading even more and faster.

Even though children may not fall seriously ill, they could still be carrying the COVID-19 virus. In fact, those without symptoms are the most dangerous hosts, as they continue with their day-to-day business unbeknownst to their infectious condition. They can infect their teachers, whose average age is 48-50, according to education unions, grandparents and, in fact, anyone they get in contact with. And we do know that the mortality rate among elderly people is in double-digit territory.

The cabinet keeps saying there is no need to close schools for the children do not get seriously ill even if they are infected with COVID-19. However, schools are inherently closed communities where the virus can spread without obstacle. (And let's not forget that Hungarian schools generally lack even the most basic hygiene tools, such as soap, paper towels or hand sanitizers.)

France used the very same argument - closed community, easy contagion - to close schools, and a lot of other countries obviously had the same or very similar consideration. On top of that, Hungary can show for coronavirus cases where they don't know how the patient got the disease and whom they had contact with before they were diagnosed. And the number of cases goes up every day.

So at this point the cabinet believes the closure of schools can be avoided, and it will not lead to such a rapid spread of the coronavirus that would cause an insurmountable problem for the health care system.

Here's a great article on why schools should be closed.

Orbán's interview made it clear that the government is reluctant to close schools on the belief that if it takes this step in the current stage of the epidemic, schools may need to remain closed for months. In other words, it had to make a choice between the impacts of an extremely uncertain course of the pandemic and the impacts of the suspension of education for different periods.

We see the same vacillation when it comes to the consideration of the economic impacts of the coronavirus. If children have to stay home, a lot of parents will not be able to go to work, and not everyone would be able to work in a home office setup. Consequently, the production loss would be more drastic than what currently be estimated. Of course, keeping the economy running is of paramount importance. If businesses go bust and a lot of people lose their jobs, it could also have serious consequences on human lives, and at a certain point this effect could be comparable with the impacts of the pandemic.

That is why governments need to find the way to successfully stop the spread of the coronavirus and not ruin the economy by all kinds of restrictive measures.

In view of the above we should keep in mind two lessons we might have learned from the COVID-19 pandemic so far:

Those countries are better off in their battle against the coronavirus that have subordinated everything to put a crimp in the spread of the coronavirus, thus avoiding to have large communities infected at once. Health care systems cannot cope with those situations and doctors are forced to make decisions on who lives and who dies (as we see it in Italy).
If Hungary botches its defence or implements the necessary measures too late, it will have no second chance. The later a country takes action, the more it will lose control of the situation.