Greece in the age of COVID-19: An unlikely success story and the new challenges ahead
Timeline, statistics and response to the pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic first appeared in Greece on 26 February 2020. The greek government to battle the spread of the pandemic had announced a series of measures such as:
a) On 27 February, the cancellation of all carnival events in the country
b) On March 10 the suspension of operations of educational institutions of all levels nationwide
c) On 13 March the closure of all cafes, bars, museums, shopping centres, sports facilities and restaurants
d) On 16 March, the closure of all retail shops and areas of religious worship, the quarantine of two villages in Northern Greece and the closure of borders with Albania, North Macedonia, Italy and Spain.
e) On 18 March, Greece announced new coronavirus restrictions about migrant camps and the closure of their external borders for non-EU members.
f) On 19 March, the economical support of businesses and employees with a series of measures of more than 10 billion euros to limit redundancies.
g) On 23 March, the restriction of all nonessential transport and movement across the country and suspension of all passenger flights from the United Kingdom. Any movement should be accompanied by a movement certificate.
The measures that were taken have proven to be quite effective and they were put in effect earlier compared to other countries. Thus, the infection and fatality curves for Greece seem quite linear, compared with other European countries of a similar population like the Netherlands, Belgium and Portugal, where the curve has an exponential behaviour. Some argue, however, that the incidents are more since there hasn’t been an extensive campaign of testing in the population e.g. South Korea has launched an extensive campaign of testing in the general population (Lifo, 2020). Be that as it may, the number of deaths is still very indicating of the situation.
Greece had scarce resources to tackle a pandemic as this one. Coming out of a decade of austerity the national healthcare expenses have been cut by 75% (aljazeera.com, 2020). The intensive care beds capacity was just about 560 last month, however, the government has increased this capacity to 910, and hired more than 4,000 extra doctors and nurses (crisismonitor.gr, 2020). These facts pushed the greek government’s hand to create a forward line of defence, which was Greece’s only real defence and it has paid off. Greece is using only a tenth of its ICU beds and has plenty of capacity left over (aljazeera.com, 2020).
Current government projects relevant to COVID-19
The COVID-19 pandemic was the motive for the Greek government to launch two new web-portals. The first one gov.gr was made to help people access public services from home, something which was long overdue, but the situation pushed for immediate action. Gov.gr includes all the digital services of 14 ministries, 34 public organisations and 3 independent authorities of the Greek government. Besides, gov.gr is the designated portal for everything that has to do with the response against the pandemic and issuing movement certificates. Movement certificates were implemented as a measure to suppress unnecessary movements allowing 6 essential types of movement to go and return from:
- Work
- Pharmacies and medical practices
- Essential shopping markets, where delivery is not possible
- Banks, when online services are inadequate
- People that are in need e.g. elderly who can do their shopping
- Ceremony (funeral, marriage, baptism etc.)
- Personal workout or walking pets
Citizens could also use the SMS service for every movement but work, by sending at 13033 the number indicating their movement type, their name and their address and receiving a text that acts as movement certificate.
The second online platform was an initiative that the ministry of tourism took to keep potential travellers engaged to essentially all things greek. The platform is supported by Google and publicly praised by Bill Gates. The visitor has the chance to discover and be inspired by the attractions, and for tourism-professionals to enhance their digital skills — and all this while staying home. Important greek athletes have supported the idea including tennis ace Stefanos Tsitsipas and NBA star Giannis Antetokounmpo who feature in YouTube videos in the platform’s channel. (ekathimerini.com, 2020).
The potential impact on the economy
Around the world, global economies have plunged many global industries into paralysis with cancelled flights and mass quarantines to disruptions in supply chains and financial markets. Specifically for Greece, Ferdinando Giugliano, in his article suggests that: “The pandemic has come at a particularly cruel time for Athens. After a decade of economic crisis, things were finally getting back on track. Prime minister Mitsotakis, of the centre-right New Democracy, won an absolute majority in the 2019 elections, on a mandate to restore international credibility and shake up the economy. Investors flocked to Greece in search of returns and opportunities, making the Athens stock exchange the best-performing in the world last year.” Greece relies heavily on tourism as it represents 25% of the country’s total gross product and because of the travel restrictions economy will suffer (Blooomberg, 2020)
A silver lining to this is the quick greek response to the outbreak, which might help the country to get the economy back on track sooner than others. The European Central Bank, after years of exclusion due to memorandum agreements, decided to include Greek bonds in its 750 billion euros ($810 billion) asset-purchase scheme, aimed at supporting the eurozone economy. Banks are also able to post Greek sovereign debt as collateral when they take up liquidity from the central banks, something that strict austerity measures prevented in previous years (Blooomberg, 2020). Giugliano states that “For years, much of Europe has looked down on Greece as an insolvable problem. For all its intrinsic fragilities, in this pandemic, Athens can walk with its head held high.”
Implications in urban design
The pandemic has been a disruptive sociological drive for the global community. A debate over the future of work around the globe and in Greece specifically has risen. Greece has always been reluctant to change. For instance, the use of debit cards wasn’t popular until 2015 and Greeks were happier to use cash for their everyday transactions. In June 2015, capital controls were introduced. This forced Greeks to use cards for their everyday transactions and the use of cards is still widespread even after the lift of capital controls on the 1st of September 2019. Employers in Greece have always seen working from home with certain disbelief of its practicality and effectiveness. However, the pandemic did change their perspective, as employers around the globe implemented remote working schemes.
This effectively creates a new interest in remote working is not without merit. It allows companies to comply with the new reality, creates opportunities to hire top talent with few geographic limits, avoid the significant overheads associated with office buildings and supplies(Inc.com,2020). This transition from collective to remote working, and the architectural considerations it will mean for living and office spaces, old and new, was evident long before the current coronavirus pandemic cast it into the public consciousness (Huffington Post, 2020). This would create quite a great disruption on urbanism as it makes a decentralised model of working more and more applicable and easier to implement.
The pandemic made people question the way we see life and specifically urban life, as metropolitan areas were the most prime of candidates for COVID-19 to spread with ease. Greece has so far avoided the worst of the crisis with widespread isolation and clear communication of the dangers to the public and according to Forsyth “ The key health crisis from COVID-19 is likely to appear in more crowed settlements without adequate water supplies and sanitation, but these have been a focus of public health concern for a long time. While cities will not be eliminated, a long period of suppression may well change patterns of urban life.” This statement is fully supported, but what we can experience in our everyday life during this crisis with more people working at home, and more deliveries alternates the perspective of the urban fabric. (Forsyth, 2020)
It seems that infectious diseases pandemic become relevant again in urban planning, as urban designers were focused on chronic disease, hazards and disasters and the vulnerable. The current pandemic brings the question of designing for infectious diseases back to the forefront, where it always should have been. Will we rise to the challenge?
Anastassis Parmaksizoglou holds an MEng in Rural and Surveying Engineering from National Techinical University of Athens and an MSc in Smart Cities and Urban Analytics from University College of London. He works in the construction industry in London since 2018.
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