It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, March 29, 2020
Italy's UniCredit puts 2019 dividend, share buyback on hold after ECB recommendation
By Valentina Za Reuters 29 March 2020 A view of the Unicredit headquarters of which many employees are working from home due to a coronavirus outbreak, in Milan By Valentina Za
MILAN (Reuters) - UniCredit on Sunday became the first Italian bank to comply with regulatory calls to preserve capital to support the economy against the coronavirus, putting on hold plans to pay dividends on 2019 results and to buy back shares.
The European Central Bank told euro zone banks on Friday to skip dividend payments and share buybacks until the start of October at the earliest and use profits instead to boost capital and their ability to withstand losses and to lend.
As measures to fight the pandemic lead to a paralysis of economic activity, banks are on the front line in a battle to keep cash-starved businesses alive.
After rushing to ease capital and bad-loan rules to keep credit flowing, regulators expect banks in turn at least to temporarily withhold shareholder remuneration.
UniCredit, Italy's largest bank by assets, said it was withdrawing a proposal for shareholders to approve a dividend of 63 euro cents per share and authorise a share buyback for up to 467 million euros ($520 million) when they meet on April 9.
The bank said it reserved the right to submit again to shareholders the same proposals after Oct. 1 depending on the ECB review of its recommendation.
The decision not to distribute part of last year's profits as dividends will add 0.37 percentage point to UniCredit's core capital ratio, it said.
The board of rival heavyweight Intesa Sanpaolo meets on Tuesday to discuss the ECB's recommendation.
Following a successful restructuring under Chief Executive Jean Pierre Mustier, UniCredit had been focusing on boosting returns for shareholders through a combination of dividends and buybacks, after shelving plans for a cross-border merger.
The bank said on Feb. 6 it would consider returning 50% of its underlying profit to investors as early as in 2020, reaching a capital distribution threshold it had set for 2023 under a plan unveiled in December.
Since then, however, the coronavirus contagion, which started hitting Italy in late February, has killed almost 10,800 people in the country, out of 97,689 confirmed cases - more than a third of all deaths from the respiratory disease worldwide.
A government ban on all non-essential business activity is set to plunge the Italian economy into a deep recession this year.
UniCredit said it would offer zero-interest loans to banking foundation shareholders for an amount equivalent to the dividend it would not pay in April. Such charitable entities hold in aggregate around 4.5% of UniCredit's capital.
(Reporting by Valentina Za; Additional reporting by Gianluca Semeraro; Editing by Diane Craft and Peter Cooney)
Mafia primed to feast on Italy's virus devastation
DUAL POWER IN A FAILED STATE Ella IDE and Ljubomir MILASIN AFP News 29 March 2020
Desolation for Italy, an opportunity for the mafia
As Italy mourns thousands of coronavirus dead, and survivors brace for life in an economic wasteland, one rung of society looks to win big: organised crime.
"The Italian mafia can turn threats into opportunities," top government anti-mafia investigator Giuseppe Governale told AFP.
Over 10,000 people have died in Italy of the flu-like disease, which has forced the country into a lockdown that is devastating the eurozone's third largest economy.
From the historic Cosa Nostra in Sicily, to the immensely powerful 'Ndrangheta in Calabria and trigger-happy Camorra in Naples, Italy's mafias were "caught on the back foot (by the virus), but are now organising themselves," Governale said.
The Economist Intelligence Unit said Thursday it expected Italy's GDP to contract by a colossal seven percent for the year. Italian experts say some 65 percent of Italian small and medium businesses are at risk of bankruptcy.
That is music to the ears of the country's mobs, who use extortion and usuary to feast on ailing businesses.
- 'On their terms' -
"Just look at the portfolio of the mafias, to see how much they can earn from this pandemic," Italian anti-mafia author Roberto Saviano said in an interview in the Repubblica daily this week.
"Where have they invested the last few decades? Multi-service companies (canteens, cleaning, disinfection), waste recycling, transportation, funeral homes, oil and food distribution. That's how they'll make money.
"The mafias know what you have, and will need, and they give it, and will give it, on their own terms."
Saviano pointed to the last big epidemic in Italy, the 1884 Cholera outbreak in Naples, which killed more than half of the city's inhabitants.
The government paid out vast sums for a clean-up -- which went straight into the pockets of the Camorra.
The mafia "is already carefully planning ahead to when the economy will start to be rebuilt," said Governale, who heads up Italy's anti-mafia investigation directorate (DIA).
"There will be a lot of money going around."
The 62-year old Sicilian said his team was preparing a plan to combat mafia infiltration.
"They will be looking for loopholes in the system. We'll have to keep our eyes open for... suspicious operations, the creation of new companies, dummy corporations."
Giuseppe Pignatone, a former mafia-hunter in Reggio Calabria, said the epidemic would "inevitably make the judiciary's job more difficult over the coming weeks and years".
The trials of hundreds of defendants have ground to a halt.
- 'Real danger' -
The redirection of police resources over the crisis could also contribute to the mafia blossoming, as officers "already weighed down by new roles may have to face public order problems," he said.
According to the Stampa daily, Italy's secret service has warned the government of potential riots in southern Italy -- fomented by organised crime groups -- should the virus epicentre move from north to south.
Mobsters were believed by some crime experts to have orchestrated revolts in jails across the country early on in the epidemic, with prisoners fearful of catching the disease in overcrowded facilities demanding early release.
"Very worryingly, some with lighter sentences are being allowed out," Nicola Gratteri, a leading prosecutor in the 'Ndrangheta stronghold of Calabria, told AFP.
Rights group Antigone said over 2,500 prisoners had been released since February 29 to ease overcrowding.
"People linked to the 'Ndrangheta have already been released and put under house arrest," he said.
"That presents a real danger."
COVID-19 SOCIAL DISTANCING SIGNS
ONE OF THESE SIGNS IS WRONG
FLORIDA
AMAZON WAREHOUSE SIGN
NEW JERSEY
Fears of domestic violence rise as millions confined over virus
AFP Relax 29 March 2020 Files: A person holds a sign reading 'Break the silence' at a rally against femicides and domestic violence in Le Havre, France, September 2018
With families across Europe confined to their homes to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus, fears are rising of a surge in domestic violence.
From Berlin to Paris, Madrid, Rome and Bratislava, associations that help victims of domestic violence have sounded the alarm after Europe overtook China to become the epicentre of the pandemic.
"For many people, their home is already not a safe place," says the German federal association of women's counselling centres and helplines (BFF).
But the stress caused by social isolation is exacerbating tensions and increasing "the risk of domestic and sexual violence against women and children", the association warns.
And the risks are not limited to homes where violence was already a problem before.
On top of the stress caused by confinement, fears around job security and financial difficulties are also increasing the likelihood of conflicts.
"It's putting a lot of pressure on households," says Florence Claudepierre, head of the FCPE parents' federation in the Upper Rhine, a region hit hard by the pandemic in France.
She said she is hearing stories of "parents who are cracking, who can't carry on" in families that have not previously had any problems.
In China, which is slowly emerging from several weeks of total lockdown, the women's rights organisation Weiping has reported a threefold increase in reports of violence against women.
In Spain, which has the second-worst outbreak in Europe after Italy, a 35-year-old mother of two was murdered by her partner last week.
- 'Where can I go?' -
Elsewhere, help centres have noted a drop in calls for help -- which is not necessarily seen as a good sign either.
For children, young people and women who are victims of domestic violence -- mental or physical -- the current situation means "being constantly available" for abuse by the perpetrator, the German federation stresses.
Decisions to shut down schools, sports clubs and youth centres are important to curb the spread of the virus and prevent hospitals from being overrun, acknowledges Rainer Rettinger, who heads a German child protection association.
But "who is seeing and hearing abused children today?" he asks.
"Now violence, too, has been confined. That's what we're afraid of," says Martine Brousse, head of Parisian organisation La Voix de l'Enfant (The Child's Voice).
As governments pour billions into their economies and health services, they should "not lose sight of the importance of equality and fundamental human rights," Beatrice Fresko-Rolfo, the general rapporteur on violence against women for the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe, pointed out recently.
Domestic violence associations are facing a double-edged sword: With many social workers having to work from home, they are unable to reach victims; and when people need to be brought to safety, there are often not enough places in the refuges.
"Women have called us and told us they are experiencing violence at home. They are asking: Where can I go?" says Canan Gullu, from Turkey's federation of women's organisations.
In Germany, families minister Franziska Giffey has called on municipalities to organise alternative reception facilities if necessary, while neighbouring Austria provides guaranteed places in women's refuges or the removal of violent family members from quarantined households.
In the countries with the strictest lockdowns, such as Italy, victims are exempt from some of the rules -- such as the requirement to carry a document justifying why they are leaving their home -- if they need to visit a refuge centre.
"The current situation is unprecedented," says Adriana Havasova, a psychologist from Bratislava. She hopes the confinement will be limited to two or three weeks.
If it goes on for several months, "I can't imagine how much more domestic violence could increase," she warns.
Anti-virus measures spark Mideast fears of setback in liberties AFP News 29 March 2020 Morocco deployed armoured vehicles in the capital Rabat to ensure compliance with emergency measures imposed due to the coronavirus
Armoured vehicles in the streets, hundreds arrested, smartphone surveillance -- sweeping measures to fight the coronavirus have raised concerns in the Middle East over the erosion of already threatened human rights.
As the world battles the COVID-19 pandemic, more than three billion people are now living under lockdown and, in some cases, strict surveillance.
While there is widespread acceptance that robust measures are needed to slow the infection rate, critics have voiced fears that authoritarian states will overreach and, once the public health threat has passed, keep some of the tough new emergency measures in their toolkits.
This concern is amplified in the Middle East and North Africa, with poorly ranked human rights records, a cast of authoritarian regimes able to bulk up security apparatuses largely unopposed and many states already reeling from political turmoil and economic hardship.
The sight of military vehicles patrolling otherwise empty roads to enforce curfews or lockdowns in countries such as Morocco and Jordan stands in stark contrast to mass protests which last year brought down leaders in Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon and Sudan.
The region had as of Saturday recorded 2,291 COVID-19 deaths out of 35,618 confirmed cases, according to figures collated from states and the World Health Organization, which has urged "concrete action" from governments to contain the virus.
Authorities have curtailed movement, clamped down on gatherings and arrested those who disobey the confinement orders.
In Jordan, where King Abdallah II signed a decree giving the government exceptional powers, hundreds of people have been arrested for breaking a curfew.
While the government said the powers would be used to the "narrowest extent", Human Rights Watch (HRW) urged Amman not to abuse fundamental rights for the cause of combatting the virus.
In Morocco, known for its muscular security policy, the arrests of offenders -- who risk heavy fines and jail time -- have generated little protest and are even praised on social media.
Like many countries, Morocco has bolstered a campaign against misinformation, but the adoption without debate of a law on social media controls has elicited concern.
- 'Accelerate the repression' -
Many are crying foul over surveillance in Israel, where domestic security agency Shin Bet, usually focused on "anti-terrorist activities", is now authorised to collect data on citizens as part of the fight against COVID-19.
Embattled Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew criticism for imposing the measure with an emergency decree as a parliamentary committee didn't have enough time to rule on it.
In an editorial published by the Financial Times, Israeli historian and best-selling author Yuval Noah Harari warned that, "if we are not careful, the epidemic might ... mark an important watershed in the history of surveillance.
"A big battle has been raging in recent years over our privacy. The coronavirus crisis could be the battle's tipping point," he said.
In Algeria, more than a year into an unprecedented popular movement known as "Hirak", it took the emergence of the pandemic to pause weekly protests.
But rights groups have accused Algerian authorities of using the health crisis to crack down on dissent via the courts.
"The Hirak has suspended its marches but the #Algeria government has not suspended its repression," HRW's Eric Goldstein wrote on Twitter after journalist Khaled Drareni, who had been arrested several times for covering the protests, was put in pre-trial detention on Thursday.
Lebanon faced similar accusations as police on Friday night dismantled tents in the heart of the capital Beirut where protesters had maintained a sit-in to keep up pressure on authorities.
The authorities "are taking advantage of the fact that people are preoccupied with their health and confined to repress any dissenting voices," activist and film director Lucien Bourjeily tweeted.
In the fledgling democracy of Tunisia -- a former police state where security apparatuses have seen little reform -- many have denounced heavy-handed police enforcement of pandemic-related movement restrictions.
The Tunisian League for Human Rights has requested clarifications on social distancing measures after people expressed frustration online over apparently arbitrary police interventions.
- Prisoners of conscience -
In Egypt, authorities have targeted media questioning low official virus infection figures.
British newspaper The Guardian said its correspondent was forced out of the country over an article that suggested authorities were underreporting cases.
With the number of cases rising, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's government imposed movement restrictions and threatened heavy fines and prison sentences for non-compliance.
In a country lacking an independent media or judiciary, families of prisoners of conscience sounded the alarm over the possibility of a coronavirus outbreak in overcrowded and unsanitary prisons.
Amnesty International has called for the "immediate and unconditional" release of political prisoners, estimated by rights groups to number around 60,000, only 15 of whom have so far been let out by Egyptian authorities.
Jordan, Tunisia and Sudan have ordered thousands of inmates to be freed to limit the risk of contagion.
Activists in the Gulf too have called for the release of political prisoners held in what HRW researcher Hiba Zayadin said are often overcrowded and unsanitary conditions with limited access to health care.
Kuwaiti activist Anwar al-Rasheed asked on Twitter, "In the midst of this pandemic, is it not yet the time to release prisoners of conscience?"
Some COVID-19 patients still have coronavirus after symptoms disappear: study
This scanning electron microscope image shows SARS-CoV-2 (yellow)—also known as 2019-nCoV, the virus that causes COVID-19—isolated from a patient, emerging from the surface of cells (blue/pink) cultured in the lab. Credit: NIAID-RML
In a new study, researchers found that half of the patients they treated for mild COVID-19 infection still had coronavirus for up to eight days after symptoms disappeared. The research letter was published online in the American Thoracic Society's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
In "Time Kinetics of Viral Clearance and Resolution of Symptoms in Novel Coronavirus Infection," Lixin Xie, MD, Lokesh Sharma, Ph.D., and co-authors report on a study of 16 patients with COVID-19, who were treated and released from the Treatment Center of PLA General Hospital in Beijing between January 28 and Feb. 9, 2020. Patients studied had a median age of 35.5 years.
Researchers collected samples from throat swabs taken from all patients on alternate days and analyzed. Patients were discharged after their recovery and confirmation of negative viral status by at least two consecutive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests.
"The most significant finding from our study is that half of the patients kept shedding the virus even after resolution of their symptoms," said co-lead author Dr. Sharma, instructor of medicine, Section of Pulmonary, Critical Care & Sleep Medicine, Department of Medicine, Yale School of Medicine. "More severe infections may have even longer shedding times."
The primary symptoms in these patients included fever, cough, pain in the pharynx (pharyngalgia) and difficult or labored breathing (dyspnea). Patients were treated with a range of medications.
The time from infection to onset of symptoms (incubation period) was five days among all but one patient. The average duration of symptoms was eight days, while the length of time patients remained contagious after the end of their symptoms ranged from one to eight days. Two patients had diabetes and one had tuberculosis, neither of which affected the timing of the course of COVID-19 infection.
"If you had mild respiratory symptoms from COVID-19 and were staying at home so as not to infect people, extend your quarantine for another two weeks after recovery to ensure that you don't infect other people," recommended corresponding author Lixin Xie, MD, professor, College of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Chinese PLA General Hospital, Beijing.
The authors had a special message for the medical community: "COVID-19 patients can be infectious even after their symptomatic recovery, so treat the asymptomatic/recently recovered patients as carefully as symptomatic patients."
The researchers emphasized that all of these patients had milder infections and recovered from the disease, and that the study looked at a small number of patients. They noted that it is unclear whether similar results would hold true for more vulnerable patients such as the elderly, those with suppressed immune systems and patients on immunosuppressive therapies.
More information:De Chang et al, Time Kinetics of Viral Clearance and Resolution of Symptoms in Novel Coronavirus Infection,American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine(2020).DOI: 10.1164/rccm.202003-0524LE
Router phishing scam targets global fear over coronavirus
by Peter Grad , Tech Xplore
Credit: bitdefender
There is no tragedy serious enough that creeps somewhere around the world won't take advantage of. The cybersecurity organization Bitdefender reported this week that phishing scams preying on people's fears about coronavirus have been detected among users of Linksys and D-Link routers.
Taking advantage of routers with weak passwords, hackers reroute critical DNS IP addresses so that users seeking information about epidemic-related web sites are quietly redirected to malicious ones. The hackers mask their ruse by displaying innocuous web address names and recreating the page design of legitimate sites. When users land on the fake pages, a pop-up window instructs them to click on a link for an app providing "the latest information and instructions about coronavirus (COVID-19)."
The site falsely claims the information is provided by the World Health Organization.
If clicked, a trojan program in installed on the user's computer that can steal sensitive information. The malware, the Oski data stealer, can capture user keystrokes, take screenshots and monitor web activity, including retrieving passwords, email contents and financial transactions. It can also commandeer attached microphones and webcams.
Users without strong security measures and system passwords leave themselves highly vulnerable to such criminal activity. According to Bitdefender, DNS settings "work like a phone book… In a nutshell, DNS works pretty much like your smartphone. …Whenever you want to call someone you just look up their name instead of having to memorize their phone number."
"Once attackers change the DNS IP addresses," said Bitdefender in an advisory released Wednesday, "they can resolve any request and redirect users to webpages that attackers control, without anyone being the wiser."
Users are advised to turn off remote administration on their routers and update their systems with strong passwords. Cloud accounts should also be secured. In addition, carefully inspect email and web addresses for slight spelling variances from legitimate sites, don't click on links from unknown recipients and check www.charitynavigator.org to confirm the legitimacy of charity organizations. Also update anti-virus and malware programs.
Bitdefender estimated 1,193 downloads of the spyware globally, mainly by users in France, Germany and the United States. The source of the assault is unknown but Oski malware is commonly found on dark web forums based in Russia.
Online criminal activity always spikes during tragedy. Hours after the 9/11 Trade Tower attacks, digital scam artists posing as Red Cross volunteers were soliciting funds for victims and their families. Phishing scams proliferated after fires in Australia, California, Spain and Portugal; hurricanes in Texas and Puerto Rico; and earthquakes in Japan, Haiti and Mexico.
The global extent of the coronavirus epidemic provides rich mining opportunities for thieves. As of noon Friday, 558,358 people were infected worldwide, and 25,262 have died.
Perhaps the best advice in today's world comes from Frank Abagnale, an American security consultant best known for his career as a con man and check forger during his teenage years—he was portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio in the 2002 movie "Catch Me If You Can."
"People need to be more aware and educated about identity theft," Abagnale once said. "You need to be a little bit wiser, a little bit smarter and there's nothing wrong with being skeptical. We live in a time when if you make it easy for someone to steal from you, someone will."
In less than 48 hours, all people in New Zealand will have to self-isolate, unless they are essential service workers. This is our best chance to stop the spread of COVID-19.
But what about the tens of thousands of New Zealanders who don't have a secure home, or enough living space to avoid close or prolonged contact with others?
In Canada homelessness agencies report action against COVID-19 has not happened quickly enough and services have not received adequate support from government, putting the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in society at risk.
At a time when the New Zealand government is trying hard to stamp out coronavirus to avoid wider community spread, looking after the health of New Zealanders who are homeless, or living in crowded or emergency accommodation, has never been more urgent.
One-in-100 people in NZ are homeless
According to the 2013 census around 41,000, or 1-in-100 New Zealanders, were homeless.
This includes 28,500 New Zealanders living as temporary residents in severely crowded housing, 8,490 living in non-private accommodation run by private landlords and community organisations, as well as 4,197 who are without habitable accommodation. That's tens of thousands of people without secure or adequate accommodation.
We'll have to wait for the 2018 census to know more recent figures, and do have to take into account the NZ$2.2-billion plus per year spent on housing assistance and NZ$197-million over three years to fund 2,700 places in Housing First.
Even if the situation has improved for some people since then, given the increase in demand for housing, and the government's increased funding for community housing providers, it is likely that the number of households living in crowded or non-private accommodation has increased between census.
Housing solutions for the next 48 hours and beyond
Government has the chance to move swiftly and make people's accommodation more secure and prevent wider community spread of the coronavirus.
Building new housing is the long-term answer. But in the next 48 hours, local and central government can redirect accommodation that is no longer used by tourists for use as family homes and self-contained accommodation. That way, people who are currently homeless, living in non-private or crowded accommodation are protected.
People and families can self-isolate if they can control who they share their home with. This redirection will guarantee an income for those impacted by cancellations to accommodation bookings due to travel restrictions. Action is in society's interest.
Under the New Zealand Influenza Pandemic Plan, national and local agencies, led by Ministry of Health and public health units, will work together in response to COVID-19.
Local pandemic responses must consider public health and community welfare. It is critical that agencies establish clear lines of communication and understand one another's roles, as quickly as possible.
Given the risk for people who are homeless, each community needs to establish a list of organizations who work with people who are homeless, and identify those who are most vulnerable to COVID-19. Some public health units have begun to do so.
Community Housing Aotearoa (CHA), a peak body for the community housing sector, is well placed to link lead government agencies and public health units with community housing providers and homelessness services to implement pandemic plans.
Lead government agencies need to ensure community housing providers and homelessness services have access to the resources and equipment they need to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and deal with the consequences, if containment is no longer possible.
Some of the NZ$300 million attached to the government's new Homelessness Action Plan 2020-2023 could be prioritized and brought forward for this purpose.
Identify those in need
In the next 48 hours, government priority needs to focus on sourcing self-contained accommodation for people without shelter, living in communal forms of housing, and crowded housing with large numbers of people and families sharing facilities.
Groups who are most at risk can be identified through community housing providers who have contracts with the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, landlords who have multiple bonds lodged with the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, and some councils that register boarding houses.
Local environmental health officers and homelessness agencies will know where people who require protection and support are. Priority can start with households who are medically most vulnerable and extend to as many households as possible to reduce the risk of transmission.
The government's immediate priority needs to focus on supporting organizations to obtain self-contained accommodation for people sleeping rough or living in emergency housing that uses dormitory style accommodation.
It is not possible for people to protect themselves from infection and self-isolate in these situations. There is a risk infection will spread quickly in these environments.
Families who are living in communal emergency housing or severely crowded housing are another priority group. To prevent spread of COVID-19, the government needs to provide self-contained accommodation with adequate bedrooms for household members and a private bathroom, or more than one bathroom for larger families.
There is a window of opportunity for government to seek accommodation, so people are able to self isolate to protect themselves. In turn this protects the community and public health.
Supplying quarantined households in need
In the next 48 hours, government and community agencies need to clarify who will fund and deliver supplies for households in self-isolation or living in premises that have been quarantined. As yet this is unclear.
Households will need food, medicine, extra cleaning and personal hygiene products for each member of the family. These measures to protect and support people are especially important over the next month, but may be required through multiple waves of the pandemic. The response will need to remain in place until hopefully a vaccine is found.
This pandemic is an extraordinary situation. It highlights the importance of the right to housing. Housing has a central role in promoting population health and avoiding health inequalities.
Stay positive, Scott Morrison: when you berate people for bad behaviour, they do it more by Peter Bragge and Liam Smith, The Conversation
COVID-19 is a rare moment in time where individual behaviours can have profound impacts on society.
To address some of the negative impacts, politicians are talking to the public using a style familiar to anyone who has looked after children: forceful and direct appeals to stop engaging in unhelpful behaviours.
Take the example of hoarding. A week ago, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said: "Stop hoarding. I can't be more blunt about it. Stop it. … It's one of the most disappointing things I've seen in Australian behaviour in response to this crisis."
Clearly, this is borne out of frustration. But this approach to behaviour change may do more damage than good for three reasons that are well-established in behavioural science: negative normative messaging, paternalistic messaging and untrusted messengers.
Saying 'don't do' something makes the behaviour more likely
It's widely known in the behavioural sciences that our impressions of what other people are doing influence our own behaviour.
In research conducted by leading psychology researchers, including Wes Schultz and Robert Cialdini, people were informed how much energy their neighbours were using to see what the impact would be on their own usage.
Importantly, it influenced high- and low-energy users in different ways—high users reduced their usage, but low users increased theirs.
The lesson here is that people look for signals—both consciously and unconsciously—that tell them what behaviours are normal, and this perception is a powerful influence on their own behaviour.
So when leaders say "stop doing" something, people can interpret this as "lots of people are doing this, otherwise they wouldn't be saying not to" and "because lots of people are doing it, it's a normal thing to do."
So the message can have the opposite effect to what is intended—the undesirable behaviour increases because it is perceived as normal.
One positive-focused campaign that worked
As behavioural researchers, we've used this established principle to craft a successful mass-media public campaign in Victoria.
Several years ago, the Victorian Department of Health and Human Services faced the challenge of unnecessary calls to the 000 emergency call centre rising faster than population growth.
Our background research showed that previous campaigns focusing on "don't do this" messaging caused a rise in unnecessary calls to 000 because it promoted "negative norms".
So, we focused on the opposite—a positive (do this) campaign, Save Lives. Save Ambulances for Emergencies. A follow-up campaign, Meet the Team highlighted alternatives to dialling 000 for minor ailments—pharmacies, the nurse-on-call service and local general practitioners.
These campaigns were successful in shifting attitudes to appropriate ambulance use, leading to changes in the target behaviour - fewer unnecessary calls to 000. Ambulance Victoria CEO Tony Walker said: "In my mind it's helped save lives … We saw a reduction in calls—around 50 less per day and that's 10 ambulances that were therefore available."
Why 'top-down' messaging is ineffective
When politicians frame a message in a paternalistic way to constituents, it can also be ineffective for at least two reasons.
The first is the behaviour politicians are seeking to correct can seem perfectly reasonable and rational to the people doing it. Thus, berating people for such behaviour is likely to be ineffective. (For example, they might say, "my situation is different because…" or "I'm doing it for my family".)
As a result, the message and/or the source would be dismissed. This may lead to people then dismissing future messages from politicians.
Another issue is that messaging done in a "top down" way threatens our autonomy - one of the most important human needs, and one directly related to well-being.
When autonomy is threatened, people react in various ways. These include expressions of distrust ("I don't like it") or doubt ("is this needed?"), avoidance of the message, and—most importantly in the COVID-19 context—efforts to reassert autonomy by defying change.
The paternalistic tone is compounded by the fact that unfortunately, politicians are not the flavour of the month.
Research shows trust of federal and state governments is at an all-time low, with nearly two-thirds of people believing politicians lack honesty and integrity.
So, what should the government be doing differently in its coronavirus messaging? Here are a few simple strategies.
First, emphasise positive behaviours. Thanking people for their good behaviour, which Berejiklian also did in her address, is a good start. This could also draw upon how well communities responded to the summer bushfire crisis. For example, a positive message might say: "Just as in the bushfires, Australians are looking after each other in the COVID-19 response. Many people are heeding advice to stay at home. This is saving lives. "
Second, alter the paternalistic tone to more inclusive language that makes people feel part of the change. Governments and other messengers should amplify messages that say "together, we are fighting a virus to save lives".
Finally, consider other messengers. For example, good proponents for non-hoarding behaviours may be older, well-respected Australians such as retired AFL player Ron Barassi or former Governor-General Quentin Bryce. The voices of respected figures like these may reach people that tune out anything politicians say.
This is an incredibly difficult time for governments and other leaders. They are getting the very best advice from medical experts, based on the best knowledge available, about what behaviours can flatten the curve of coronavirus infections.
Leaders of the world's largest economies came together at a virtual G20 this week to "do whatever it takes to overcome the coronavirus pandemic". But the reality is that global capacity to deal with the greatest challenge to international well-being since the second world war is both limited and fractured.
A G20 statement at the end of a 90-minute hookup of world leaders said the right things about avoiding supply-chain disruptions in the shipment of medical supplies, and their agreement to inject A$8.2trillion into the global economy.
By all accounts, interactions between the various players were more constructive than previous such gatherings in the Donald Trump era.
However, emollient words in the official statement, in which the leaders pledged a "common front against this common threat", could not disguise deep divisions between the various players.
The US and China might have acknowledged the need for coordinated action to deal with the pandemic and its economic consequences, but this hardly obscures the rift between the world's largest economies.
While Trump says he and Chinese President Xi Jinping have a good relationship, the fact remains Washington and Beijing are at loggerheads over a range of issues that are not easily resolved.
These include trade in all its dimensions. And central to that is a technology "arms race".
Then there is Trump's persistent—and deliberately provocative—reference to a "Chinese virus". Beijing has strongly objected to this characterisation.
Overriding all of this is China's quest for global leadership in competition with the US and its allies. The US and its friends see this quest as both relentless and disruptive.
In its response to the coronavirus pandemic, which originated in China's Hubei province, Beijing has sought to overcome world disapproval of its initial efforts to cover up the contagion by stepping up its diplomatic efforts.
In this we might contrast China's approach with that of the Trump administration, which continues to emphasise an inward-looking "America first" mindset.
These nativist impulses have been reinforced by a realisation of America's dependence on Chinese supply chains. The US imports a staggering 90% of its antibiotics from China, including penicillin. America stopped manufacturing penicillin in 2004.
In remarks to pharmaceutical executives earlier this month, Trump said dependence on Chinese pharmaceutical supply chains reinforced the
"importance of bringing all of that manufacturing back to America."
Tepid American support for international institutions like the United Nations and its agencies, including, principally, the World Health Organisation, is not helpful in present circumstances.
Trump's verbal onslaught against "globalism" in speeches to the UN has undermined confidence in the world body and called into question American support for multilateral responses to global crises.
Ragged responses to the coronavirus pandemic are a reminder of the dangers inherent in a world in which global leadership has withered.
In Europe, leaders spent most of Thursday arguing over whether a joint communique would hint at financial burden-sharing to repair the damage to their economies.
Germany and the Netherlands are resisting pressures to contribute to a "coronabonds" bailout fund to help countries like Italy and Spain, hardest hit by the pandemic.
This reluctance comes despite a warning from European Central Bank president Christine Lagarde that the continent is facing a crisis of "epic" proportions.
Resistance to a push by European leaders, led by France's Emmanuel Macron, to collectively underwrite debt obligations risks fracturing the union.
These sorts of geopolitical tensions are inevitable if the pandemic continues to spread and, in the process, exerts pressures on the developed world to do more to help both its own citizens and those less fortunate.
In an alarming assessment of the risks of contagion across conflict zones, the International Crisis Group (ICG) identifies teeming refugee camps in war-ravaged northern Syria and Yemen as areas of particular concern.
In both cases, medical assistance is rudimentary, to say the least, so the coronavirus would not be containable if it were to get a grip.
In its bleak assessment, the ICG says: "The global outbreak has the potential to wreak havoc in fragile states, trigger widespread unrest and severely test international crisis management systems. Its implications are especially serious for those caught in the midst of conflict if, as seems likely, the disease disrupts humanitarian aid flows, limits peace operations and postpones ongoing efforts at diplomacy."
In all of this, globalisation as a driver of global growth is in retreat at the very moment when the world would be better served by a "globalised" response to a health and economic crisis.
These challenges are likely to far exceed the ability of the richest countries to respond to a global health emergency.
The disbursement of A$8.2trillion to stabilise the global economy will likely come to be regarded as a drop in the bucket when the full dimensions of a global pandemic become apparent.
Medical experts contend the spread of coronavirus in the US will not peak for several weeks. This is the reality Trump appears to have trouble grasping.
Leaving aside the response of countries like the US, China, Italy, Spain and South Korea, whose health systems have enabled a relatively sophisticated response to the virus, there are real and legitimate concerns about countries whose healthcare capabilities would quickly become overburdened.
In this category are countries like Pakistan, India, Indonesia and Bangladesh, which is housing some 1 million Rohingya refugees.
Questions that immediately arise following the "virtual" leaders' summit are:
How would the world cope with a raging pandemic that is wiping out tens of thousands in places like Syria and Yemen?
What body will coordinate the $8.2trillion to stabilise the global economy?
What role will the International Monetary Fund play in this rescue effort?
What additional resources might be allocated to the World Health Organisation to coordinate a global effort to withstand a health tsunami?
The short answer to these questions is that the world is less well-equipped to deal with a crisis of these dimensions than it might have been if global institutions were not under siege, as they are.
The present situation compares unfavourably with the G20 responses to the Global Financial Crisis of 2008/9. Then, American leadership proved crucial.
In this latest crisis, no such unified global leadership has yet emerged.
The further splintering of an international consensus and retreat from a globalising world as individual states look out for themselves may well prove one of the enduring consequences of the coronavirus pandemic. This would be to no-one's particular advantage, least of all the vulnerable
