Welcome to Prognosis. I'm Laura Carlson. It's day forty seven since coronavirus was declared a global pandemic. Our main story. The closest thing we have to a giant laboratory for studying coronavirus is Iceland. The tiny, isolated nation has some of the perfect conditions for observing and tracking the spread of COVID nineteen, including a public that trusts its government. The research the government has done there is already informing
the rest of the world. But first, here's what happened today. In the US, calculations about when and how to ease up on social distancing measures have been left almost entirely to states. Some states have already taken steps to reopening today. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp, in a controversial move, allowed barbershops, bowling alleys, and other high contact businesses to open up again.
But in New York State, the location hardest hit by the virus, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced a more cautious roadmap towards restarting some economic activity. In a briefing over the weekend, Cuomo talked about a phased in reopening that could start as soon as May fifteen, it would begin with construction and manufacturing companies. This comes as deaths in the state dropped to their lowest level in almost a month. New
hospitalizations and intensive cases continue to fall. While the governor said the worst was over, it is clear the state has a long way to go before returning to normal. On Monday, officials announced they would cancel the state's presidential primary, sketch old for June. When the US Small Business Administration's loan program reopened today after a fresh cashion fusion, almost immediately it became impossible for lenders to use the government system.
A flood of applications caused the system to crash as early as four minutes after it opened up. Bloomberg News reported the SBA hopes to help mom and pop shops access a larger share of the new loan money than in the first round of funding. They're doing this by capping the amount of loan relief banks are allowed to process.
Advocates of small businesses were concerned the biggest banks could dominate disbursement of the three hundred and twenty billion dollars in loans and keep mom and pop shops from getting access.
There was an uproar when the program first launched. After big national chains including Potbelly Corporation and the operator of Ruth's Chris Steakhouses, landed ten million dollars or more are a piece in loans thanks to a loophole, Millions of very small businesses, on the other hand, were left stranded when the program ran out of money. Countries in Europe are pushing ahead with steps to relax lockdowns that slowed the spread of the coronavirus. That's despite concerns these moves
could backfire. Switzerland on Monday allowed an array of retailers as well as tattoo studios to open their doors. The Swiss flocked to gardening stores to catch up on spring planting. France and Spain may outline more steps towards relaxing restrictions on Tuesday, and now our main story. Iceland has become one of the best places in the world to study COVID nineteen. That's because the country is an island nation with only one real port of entry and a small population.
It also introduced widespread testing as soon as the virus arrived in March. Now Iceland has become a real world coronavirus laboratory and its work over the last few months is starting to produce results. Bloomberg reporter Kristen V. Brown traveled to Reggy, vic Iceland, just as the global scale of a pandemic was starting to become clear. She has more on what the Nordic nation has since learned about
how the virus moves through a population. In early March, I was in Recabec sitting in the office of Cowdie Stephenson, the founder of this pioneering population genetics firm Decode. I was there reporting a podcast about fertility, and Cowdy just couldn't stand topic. He was pretty distracted. His phone was ringing NonStop. People kept knocking on the door. Let me
tell let me tell you what. I am a struggling a little bit with this discussion because we are now facing viral epidemic which is going to have historic impact, and because it looks like this is going to be the first time in history of mankind where an epidemic like these spreads to entire species and I'm very very sure pays attack and it looks like it's going to have a very serious impact on the functions world of
our nations. This was about a week before the US had declared a state of emergency big outbreaks of the virus. We're still limited to a handful of countries, including China and Italy, and Iceland only had three cases, all people returning from a ski holiday. But Caldi was already mobilizing. He wanted to test everyone in the country for COVID nineteen, or at least anyone who had so much as the sniffles, I have to talk to the certain general because he has to clear she has to approve of of us
stepping in. Usually what is missing all over the world is enough screening. So what we're gonna do is calling everyone who as sign about respiratory infection, all of those with flu and cold and whatever, and screening to figure out how the values are spreading in society. Since there's only one doorway into Iceland, we have an incredible opportunity to figure out how the epidemic is spreading between people, and that is what we need to know. A few
minutes later, the phone rang. It was Iceland's director of Health Almamler alum with with Shelton Funn is everything okay, early, gonna let you do that? They will, they will let us do with this nothing else makes sense. I was the rare witness to how fast things moved in Iceland. In the course of a one hour interview, Cowery as the Director of Health for permission to launch a massive testing effort, and got it a month and a half later. Iceland has one of the most robust testing programs in
the world. To date, it has tested more than forty six thousand residents. That's nearly of its population. In contrast, New York, which has a more aggressive testing effort than any other U S state, has tested just over four Turning Iceland into a laboratory has yielded real results. The nation has more than seventeen hundred people who have tested positive for the virus, which is a lot for a small country, but authorities say they feel like it's now
under control. All that's because the number of new infections each day has been steadily decreasing since the beginning of April. Just a handful of other countries have seen such a significant decline in cases. Recently. I caught up Cowry to talk about how things were going. We have not taken any of these darconic measures that all the nations have done. Me enough close to our boats. We have kept our elementary school and child care center openly, have kept the
stores open. We have put abandoned the gathering of more than twenty people, and we have encouraged people to keep a social distance of two ms, and encouraged people to work as much from homeless, plus and and and the consequence of these has been that we have the epidemic under controls Iceland has also created an app that lets people know if they've come into contact with someone who
has the virus. But the value of Sceland's efforts aren't just in demonstrating how an aggressive testing program can really slow the spread of the virus. It's also helped researchers understand how the virus spreads. Iceland is basically the size of a really robust scientific study, and Decode has taken advantage of that. Cowari says that Decode has been able to trace the origins of every single case of the virus in the country, how the virus has changed, and
how it spreads from one person to another. So if a Peter is diagnosed and he has been in contest with Maddie and John, we can determine whether he was infected by Maddie or John. By having the sequence of the virus and all sea of them, it is really gives you an effective way of confirming the vein mister virus is moving in society. Iceland is also one of the few countries that from the get go prioritized screening
not just sick people, but healthy ones too. This has led to some really important insights into how the virus operates. For example, screening people without any symptoms revealed the asymptomatic people play a big part in spreading COVID. Nineteen researchers also identified almost three hundred mutations that haven't yet been
seen anywhere else in the world. Viral mutations help scientists understand things like how likely someone is to get reinfected, why some people get so much sicker than others, and how the virus spreads. Ragna Hilda da Daughter is a freelance reporter for Bloomberg and Recivic. She says that part of the reason Iceland's response has been so successful is that almost everybody trusts the government. There's been a lot of trust in the health authorities in Iceland how they're
tackling this. So I would say, you know, there are We're a little bit used to ups and downs, and even though this is a different kind of, you know, of a crisis, we are also used to we had the financial crisis ten years ago. We are used to having volcanoes that you know, blow up on us. So I think the nation is kind of taking this as a as another task like that. In a way. Radmulder herself got tested their decode Cowlies company show up. It
was very quick, almost like just walking through. They put the swap up your nose and and you're done. And I got the results within a few hours, so I was very impressed. In fact, for contrast, in the US, at the height of our testing crisis, it often took weeks to return results. It usually still takes days now. Iceland is tiny. It's much easier to test huge percentages of the population when your country is smaller than a
city like Oakland where I live. Still, this kind of information can help public health efforts better hone in on how the virus might spread anywhere. The number of silent carry years, for example, suggest widespread testing of those with and without symptoms may be necessary to control the disease. Decodes parent company, the pharmaceutical giant am Gin is working on developing novel coronavirus treatments that use antibodies to attack
the virus. Decodes research will also inform that work, providing genetic insights from patients who are previously infected. So much about this virus is still a mystery, though decode has its work cut out for it. Are you realize you know I have been working on all kinds of diseases, start trying to feature out the passive genesis of all kinds of diseases for about years, all right, and all of a sudden into my life force of disease where all of the questions are announcers. So in the middle
of this fiding, that is a peace to me. Cowdery says that Iceland's real strength is that it pulled all of its resources to tackle this crisis. I can tell you that everyone is pulling together. I can tell you that that when we run out of swaps, I got phone called from from the CEO of Gold knows how many companies in Iceland asking me whether we could use their connection in the world to find slabs for us.
Just yesterday, just yesterday, there was achievements of our large number of respirators to Iceland because there were four keeen companies in Iceland who used their connection to find respirators that are so how to come by this day, the whole community is turning its back together and it is beautiful. We are an unruly national scandal lists who cannot find ease when thinks you're going well, But when there is a crisis, we are better than any other nations and
the world. There have been critics who think that Iceland has not been aggressive enough, that like many places, they should have shut down schools and stores and restaurants. But in the midst of a global pandemic, Iceland has shown that a tiny island nation in the middle of the Atlantic can teach the rest of the world a lesson or two. That was Bloomberg reporter Kristen V. Brown and
that's our show today. For coverage of the outbreak from one and twenty bureaus around the world, visit Bloomberg dot com slash Coronavirus and of course, if you appreciate the show, please leave us a review and a rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. The best way to help more listeners find our global reporting. The Prognosis Daily edition is hosted by Me Laura Carlson. The show was produced by Me, Top Forehead, Jordan gas Pure and mag Miss Hendrickson. Today's
main story was reported by Kristin V. Brown. Original music by Leo Sidran. Our editors are Francesco Levi and Rick Shine. Francesco Levi is Bloomberg's head of podcasts. Thanks for listening.