It comes as no surprise that the pandemic has affected many lives globally, forcing everyone to accept a new norm of masks, SOPs, and lockdowns. Malaysia is also no stranger to lockdowns, having implemented various MCOs to combat the pandemic since the start of 2020. Every MCO since then has been associated with negatively impacting people’s mental health, reducing income in households and poverty, amongst other things.
But what about the Malaysian economy?
Efforts by the government with multiple modifications to the MCO such as RMCO, CMCO, and EMCO intended to minimise the impact on the economy while saving lives and protecting their livelihoods were made. But was it really possible to save both at the same time? While active cases were reduced with repetitive lockdowns, were we seeing the same positive performance to the economy?
