Unfortunately, recent events have suggested that travel protocols, monitoring programs and hospital procedures are not working. It's a mess of incompetence, and it goes back to central planners focusing on the economy and the stock markets and bond yields. They forget about people and their response is wholly ineffective. When Doctors Without Borders was screaming months ago that it needed more help, nothing happened. No one understood the simple equation of numbers that if you let this thing go, you've lost control. We have certainly lost control in Sierra Leone and Liberia. The Ebola virus doesn't know where the border is and the likelihood of it spreading to Ivory Coast and Ghana is very high. The jury is still out on how the developed counties will do.
Fear of travel and business disruption is definitely going to have an impact on a fragile economy already weakened by recessions in Europe and Japan. An event like this could have serious negative repercussions because it changes people's behaviors. If people worried about the security of bank deposits start pulling their money out, they would logically want to shift to gold and silver. All of a sudden, investors would come back into these markets and push the price up. No one is considering that. The natural Armageddon of disease could cause a financial Armageddon and precious metals are the natural comfort play.
