Ask HN: What societal changes will result from Coronavirus?

From a purely IT perspective, a lot more infrastructure to do with working from home is being thoroughly tested. Knowing how large numbers of home workers cope with the isolation and the infrastructure available within their companies could lead to even more people working away from company offices. This in turn could lead to better comms infrastructure, but with reduce commuters to major centres of work, the public transport companies may have to scale back. In turn less sandwich shops, less taxis, etc.

People going through this sort of experience I hope will lead to people taking on a greater expectation of the importance of good hygiene. When the flu seasons starts again at the end of the year this experience will hopefully still be strong in people's minds and they'll be more careful about simply ignoring it.

As Winter comes back around at the end of the year I think people may start to change certain habits, more people wearing masks in public as annual flu rises again, people less willing to shake hands or kiss each other openly if they're not already intimate. Many European cultures regard the touch of cheek-on-cheek to be a mark of affection among friends, will that action simply start to die out as people are reluctant to touch each other.

Ultimately you can't tell, but I think post-COVID will certainly a very intersting time for the social behaviour observers and the stats collectors. Interesting times for sure.

Depends a lot on whether or not there's a vaccine/cure.

We might still be dealing with COVID-19. Ideally, we probably still would be at the peak of it, if we managed to flatten the curve.

With all the resources focused on this, it will likely cause an economic shock. Italy's deep in debt, suspending taxes and mortgages. Other countries will soon follow. Our economic systems today are remarkably fragile - we make 50 year investments, take on lots of debt and debtors, whereas in the past, economies are built with the inevitability of war in mind.

We tend to abstract things out like supply chains. Your sandwich and coffee might go through a dozen countries. What happens when it's no longer free flow? Do prices go up or down?

A lot of industries could die. Mainly airlines, who are already dealing with thin margins.

In harsh times, people either become savage survivalists or become a tight-knit tribe-like community. We'll see which way it goes.

could see people go out less / stay at home more