If Covid-19 is not telling enough, I hope news that Sir Richard Branson, the benefactor and good friend of Air Asia’s Tony Fernandes, pledging his luxury island resort as collateral to get a UK government bailout of his stricken airline Virgin Atlantic, the first aviation casualty in the Asia-Pacific region, is enough to ring a bell. It comes as Virgin Group's airline in Australia enters administration which partly-owned by Sir Richard along with Etihad, Singapore Airlines and China's HNA.

Virus is an intimate enemy but at the same time is an essential for life. Understanding it, could prove essential to deciphering this COVID-19 pandemic and possibly avoiding future epidemics. Its omnipresence is just part of humankind’s evolution and biodiversity and the latest Covid-19 clearly showed the extent of our ignorance in this area. Viruses can only replicate by infecting a host cell that they reprogram to their own advantage and viruses can also be infected by other viruses. Like some bacteria, it causes disease in humans as exemplified by Covid-19.
 

According to Patrick Forterre of the Pasteur Institute, we have to thank to syncytin, a protein of viral origin derived from an ancient retrovirus (of the same family as HIV) that incorporate into our genetic code, preventing the mother from rejecting the foetus and seemed to have played a key role in the formation of the nervous system in vertebrates. In another word, we have been cohabiting with viruses at all times - to the point of having some of them ‘embedded’ into our genetic code. It is our own doing with the invasion and destruction of ecosystems that lead to the emergence of new viruses. In the cases of SARS and MERS and for current COVID-19 pandemic, the reservoir species for which the virus is naturally adapted - appears to be a particular species of bat to have been transmitted to humans.

The latest study by Professor Li Lanjuan (first scientist to propose Wuhan lockdown) and her colleagues of Zhejiang University found that for the first time with laboratory evidence that certain Covid-19 mutations could create strains deadlier than others. New York strains, which imported from Europe are much deadlier and the death rate in New York matching to that in many European countries, if not worse. This discovery can help to current standardized treatment of patients regardless the strains they have. Li’s team detected more than 30 mutations. Among them 19 mutations – or about 60% – were new which lead to functional changes in the virus’ spike protein and infectivity! According to the China National Centre for Bioinformation, more than 10,000 strains had been sequenced by scientists around the globe, containing more than 4,300 mutations. And latest study by Frank Ruschitzka, University Hospital Zurich suggests that the virus attacks the lining of blood vessels all over the body, reduces the blood flow to different parts of the body and eventually stops blood circulation which can ultimately lead to multiple organ failure.

What I do is the responsible thing to keep people from dying. But as soon as we go down this path, you can take a V-shaped recovery off the table. One sure thing is that we will emerge from this pandemic transformed, we should be reopening to a changed economic landscape and it can usher in tremendous opportunities across the board.

Stay strong, stay safe, stay home, be kind!

Chee Seng, Wong
CIO, Athena Advisors
wong-chee-seng@outlook.com