In a World Shattered by Virus, a One-Time Rising Star Falls Hard

  • Businesses still reeling after Peru throws everything at Covid
  • After harsh lockdown, massive stimulus, GDP seen falling 12%

A health worker prepares to test an employee of the Ciudad de Dios market in Lima.

Photographer: Ernesto Benavides/AFP via Getty Images
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Peru is emerging from coronavirus with one of the world’s deepest recessions and largest per-capita death tolls despite winning early international praise for the way it handled the disease.

The outcome is surprising as the South American country has been fighting the pandemic with a textbook anti-virus plan, including a strict quarantine that shut down most industries for two months and an ambitious stimulus plan to cope with the resulting economic contraction.