What a crazy world we live in

What a crazy world we live in.  For the last number of weeks, we have been jostling around to find our new normal.  I still have my surreal moments… on a daily basis.  Besides listening to investment conference calls and reading numerous articles about the virus and its impact on the economy, there’s one website that I use throughout the day to look for signs of hope: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/.  It is an excellent source to stay on track of the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) Pandemic.

Immediately you can see the total cases globally along with those who have recovered and those who unfortunately have succumbed to the virus.  It goes on to show the percentage of active cases that are in mild condition along with those that are in serious or critical care.  Where it becomes even more valuable is that it shows all the cases by country.   Here you can start to see the important distinctions between each country.  In all, a total of 209 countries and territories have been affected.  One observation is that the daily case counts are levelling off in Europe.  There is no one country more important than another during this terrible time, but my focus for now is on the hot spots.  At the time of this writing Italy, Spain, Germany and many others appear to be turning the corner.  The United States currently has 10 different states with daily case counts of 1,000 each.  Some bumper crop numbers out of our beloved Canada hurts to see.

Testing, testing and more testing, I say.  This has proven critical to the case counts and will help for the future for when – and not if – this ever were to happen again.   There are varying scorecards in the preparedness category for countries around the world.  Governments take note as this can greatly be improved upon. Please take the time to review the website; by watching it daily you can start to unearth important trends.

I am an eternal optimist and so I will leave you with this quote from Tom Hanks’ (who has himself along with his wife contracted the Coronavirus and subsequently recovered) character in the movie Cast Away. He may have perfectly captured the mood to bring to these challenging times when he said, “I gotta keep breathing. Because tomorrow the sun will rise. Who knows what the tide could bring?”.

At Kudsia Leith Sanchez, we can’t thank you enough for your kind words during these difficult times.  Thank you again for your trust, satisfaction and confidence in us.  In the meantime, the number one objective is for you and your loved ones to stay safe.  This shall pass…

~ Paco

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