The Economist USA 03.28.2020

The EconomistMarch 28th 2020 3

1 Contents continues overleaf

Contents

The world this week

5 A summary of political

andbusinessnews

Leaders

7 The state and covid-

Everything’s under

control

8 The next calamity

Covid-19 and the

emerging world

9 America’s $2trn rescue

Mixedmedicine

9 Iranandcovid-

Getserious

10 Videoconferencing

etiquette

Throughthekeyhole

Letters

14 OnTaiwan,Myanmar,

primaries,elephants,

FreemanDyson,

congenitaldiseases,

housenames

Briefing

15 Thepandemicand

thestate

Creatinga coronopticon

18 Economicpolicyand

thevirus

Thepillarsofstate

Specialreport:

TheAfricancentury

Afterpage 40

United States

21 A $2trn bazooka

22 The virus and the young

24 Love under lockdown

24 The virus behind bars

26 Teen sexting

27 The Green Party

28 LexingtonUS-China

relations

The Americas

29 BolsoNero

30 The world’s busiest

border closes, sort of

32 BelloThe economic cost

of covid-

Asia

33 Japan, the Olympics and

covid-

34 Politics in Bangladesh

34 Sexual abuse in South

Korea

35 BanyanTaiwan and

covid-

36 Locking down India and

Pakistan

China

37 Going back to work

40 ChaguanOpportunity

amid crisis

Middle East & Africa

41 Covid-19 in Africa

43 Arab states clamp down

44 The virus reaches Gaza

BartlebyThe challenges

of concentrating during a

lockdown, page 59

On the cover

Big government is needed to
fight the pandemic. It may not
shrink again afterwards:
leader, page 7. How modern
data infrastructure can help
fight covid-19, page 15. Rich
countries are experimenting
with radical new economic
policies. History suggests that
the effects will be permanent,
page 18. A new era of
sovereign-debt management:
Free exchange, page 67.
America has a $2trn rescue
package, page 21. Its design is
less than perfect: leader,
page 9

• Covid-19 in the emerging
  worldThe virus threatens to
  devastate poor countries:
  leader, page 8. Africa is woefully
  ill-equipped to cope, page 41.
  India and Pakistan try to keep a
  fifth of humanity at home,
  page 36. Latin American
  governments scramble to save
  their economies: Bello, page 32.
  Africa is changing so rapidly that
  in the decades to come it will be
  hard to ignore, says Jonathan
  Rosenthal. See our special
  report after page 40

We are working hard to

ensure that there is no dis-

ruption to print copies of

The Economistas a result of

the coronavirus. But if you

have digital access as part of

your subscription, then acti-

vating it will ensure that you

can always read the digital

version of the newspaper as

well as all of our daily jour-

nalism. To do so, visit

economist.com/activate