THE LONG-TERM negative impact of lockdown will depend on whether or not the difficult balance between safety, security and sanity is struck. But the long-term positive consequence of the pandemic itself could well be the recovery of our sense of the common good. If we did not appreciate it before, it is now blindingly obvious that the health and wellbeing of any individual or nation depends directly on the health and wellbeing of all.

Of course, it’s also impossible to compare, let alone calibrate, the effects experienced by different nations. Some have suffered more and will doubtless suffer longer. One such nation is tiny, beleaguered Lebanon. The terrifying explosion last August, killing 160 and leaving 300,000 homeless, almost totally destroyed East Beirut. But that was only the latest catastrophe to descend on this uniquely cosmopolitan corner of the Levant. Lebanon, barely the size of Wales, was already in economic freefall and politically approaching the status of a “failed state” when Covid struck. And now, having lost in the blast its only major export exit point, the Port of Beirut, economic prospects are bleak.