The outbreak of the deadly coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) miserably ruined the desire and expectations of everyone in the entire world. The severity of the virus not only affected the health of an individual but also pushed the world economy into disaster. Most of the countries subsided it through temporary lockdown and partially secured human life by employing vaccines and other remedies. However, the impact of Covid-19 was considered a challenge for many in terms of survival and sustainability. Hence this chapter has attempted to identify several issues about the impact of Covid-19 and provided some intelligent solutions for sustainable recovery. In this regard, the study has chosen two industries, i.e. tourism and entertainment, which contribute to a balanced economy for the growth and development of any nation. The impact study of Covid-19 will be helpful for academicians, researchers, and policymakers to identify the problems and to overcome the challenges associated with the epidemic through intelligent solutions.
TopIntroduction
The deadly coronavirus was initially detected in the city of Wuhan, China during the last week of December 2019. This disease was identified as a primary form of pneumonia that caused damage to the respiratory organ, lungs, liver and other major areas of the human body. On 31st January 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed Covid-19 as an epidemic and on 11th March 2020 considered a global pandemic according to the harshness of the disease spread. Due to the severity of the virus's spread, the impact of Covid-19 has shut down the entire globe for around eight months and destroyed the world economy. Many industries have closed their production and supply which directly hit the employment and revenue across the globe. The multi-stage mutation of the deadly coronavirus has changed the hopes and aspirations of individuals (Das et al, 2022). The partial lockdown, social distancing, therapeutic medicines, mask and sanitization may have provided some relief but not controlled the spread of the virus completely. As of 8th July 2022, the spread of coronavirus is affected 228 countries with 559,860,508 confirmed cases and 6,371,761 death cases worldwide. The inception of the Covid-19 vaccine has controlled the spread and around 532,851,614 people recovered from the disease (Debata et al, 2020). Figure 1 exhibited the top ten countries confirmed death cases till 8th July 2022.
The outbreak of the pandemic has exaggerated a sense of fear and uncertainty among people in terms of job and pay loss. The countrywide lockdown triggered the trade and business into a cut short and forced the bread earners to stay at the home. The impact of the pandemic pushed the revenue down and affected major industries such as tourism, hotels, aviation, entertainment, manufacturing, start-ups etc. The outbreak of Covid-19 not only affected the industries but also destroyed the people's expectations, environment and economy. Most of the migrant workers have returned to their homes due to curfew restrictions imposed by the government. The schools, colleges and religious places have been closed and restrictions initiated on travel. The skies became clear with a 71 per cent decrease in nitrogen dioxide level and indicated purified water in the river Ganga. The Covid-19 pandemic disrupted the world economy as production and consumption were scaled down. A developing country like India was not resistant to such kind of external shock also. The Indian tourism, hotel and aviation industries have suffered a loss of 5 lakh crore, 30,000 crores and 8,200. The agricultural sector has also been affected hugely. There is an acceleration in demand observed for wheat, vegetable and other kinds of crops during that period. The aforesaid counterattacks of Covid-19 on export and import business have also been noticed (Ghosh et al, 2020). Hence it could be observed that the impact of Covid-19 severely destroyed the economy and human life but significantly improved the environment from pollution (Nayak et al, 2022). The Covid-19 crisis has not only distressed human life but also created massive disruption across the world. In their study, the authors have articulated the possible impact of Covid-19 on six different industries such as education, tourism, publishing, automobiles, food and supply and agriculture and provided strategic steps for the revival and recovery of those industries (Brem et al, 2021). Figure 2 exhibited the major industries affected due to Covid-19.