SCOR’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Denis Kessler, has suggested that governments should “overhaul” their risk management policies after failing to respond effectively to the outbreak of the coronavirus.
Speaking in an interview with l’Express magazine, Kessler said that the pandemic and the way it has been managed have revealed a steady increase in risk aversion within modern societies.
“This historic health crisis has accelerated trends that were already at work, but are becoming increasingly clear,” Kessler told the publication.
The SCOR CEO argued that risk aversion overall is rising in every country, mainly because the most serious risks – relating to mortality and morbidity – seem more pronounced.
Although natural catastrophes can be very serious, they are always local, whereas every individual throughout the world could potentially be affected by the virus.
“This is why the impact of the pandemic is so powerful: it triggers both individual and collective fears, rendered all the more stressful because the danger is invisible,” Kessler went on.
“The current crisis will leave indelible marks on our collective unconscious. We will fear risks more deeply, and their occurrence will be increasingly traumatic. As calls for protection and prevention grow, it will be necessary to lower the probability of such traumatic events, especially catastrophic ones.”
Increased risk aversion means that risk management will have to change significantly, and it has now become clear to all that the state has ultimate responsibility for public health.
The failures of numerous governments in their pandemic response should therefore lead countries to rethink their approaches to risk management, and to better prepare for major risks that might affect their populations.
“They should prepare the most appropriate crisis-containment responses and implement them without delay, they should better coordinate the actions of civil society and the public authorities and, finally, improve communication to the general population,” said Kessler.
But Kessler also noted that a combination of higher incomes, increased education, lower discount rates and longer life expectancies has meant that that ‘economic value’ of human life has risen much more sharply than GDP in recent decades.
Spending aimed at directly or indirectly preserving the value of life thus accounts for an increasingly large share in the budgets of both governments and households.
“The rejection of all forms of suffering – not just physical, but also psychological and moral – is also on the rise,” Kessler remarked.
“According to the new value vector that is appearing, and has gained ground during the pandemic, everything must be done to ensure the global ‘integrity’ of each individual against decline, deterioration and change.”
