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Amazon, Facebook, Google and Microsoft are all encouraging employees in the Seattle area to work from home due to concerns about the coronavirus as the outbreak in Washington grows.
The coronavirus grew more deadly in the United States, with the death toll climbing to 12 on Thursday. Throughout the country, more than 225 cases have been confirmed. Yesterday, U.S. Senate has agreed on an $8 billion emergency funding package that is headed to the President. Lawmakers across the country are trying to diminish impacts of false coronavirus facts and enormous pricing of consumer medical supplies.
But investors are reacting to fears that the spread of coronavirus will disrupt the global economy, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is already falling more than 300 points in premarket trading.
No Fist-Bumps Anymore, No Toilet Paper Either
Businesses such as Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ: AMZN), Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT), Facebook Inc (NASDAQ: FB), and Salesforce.com Inc (NASDAQ: CRM), Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL) have told many of their employees to work from home. Downtown crowds have tapered off. The streets are scarily empty and now, what was known as the rush hours, have turned to minutes. Local officials have shown how to do elbow bump greetings instead of hugs or handshakes. You cannot find toilet paper on store shelves anymore (hello good old daily newspapers.)
This almost Huxley-like world is happening right here in Seattle, national epicenter of the 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak that causes the infectious disease known as COVID-19.
Be it as it may, the biggest among the tech stocks. It is already wide known that most of the big tech names have been collaborating with China, South Korea, Taiwan etc. when it comes to parts manufacturing. Since the coronavirus started its deadly hike exactly from China, Wuhan, Hubei province to be precise.
Thank You COVID-19, Seattle Is Working from Home Now
Among big tech that infamously succeeded to tract coronavirus in their lines are Amazon, Facebook, Google and Microsoft. Those companies all have headquarters in the Seattle area so they instructed their employees to work from home. When it comes to coronavirus spread, it is really easy transferred so self-isolation, for now, showed the best results (again, in China where the number of daily new infected people is slowly falling).
Facebook said on Thursday a contractor in one of its Seattle offices had been diagnosed with coronavirus. The company reported that their worker has been in Facebook’s Stadium East office in Seattle on February 21. On Wednesday, the company warned its other employees Wednesday about it and shut down the Seattle office until March 9. Employees in Seattle are encouraged to work from home until the end of the month.
Facebook, Amazon, Google, Microsoft Became Home Stationed
Facebook Inc. said a Seattle worker has been diagnosed with the coronavirus, the first known infection within the company as the pathogen continues to spread in the region.
An Amazon employee at the company’s Seattle headquarters has also contracted the virus, the company said.
The spokesperson said:
“The risk of transmission for employees who were not in close contact with this individual is assessed to be low. We are recommending that employees in Seattle/Bellevue who are able to work from home do so through the end of the month.”
Google asked its workers in Washington state who have the ability to work remotely to do so as well. It also forbids bringing visitors to its Washington-based offices.
Microsoft is allowing employees in its Seattle- and San Francisco-based offices to work from home through March 25th.
No Travelling and Public Gatherings – Hello Live-Stream
Other U.S. companies including IBM (NYSE: IBM), JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) and Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) already restricted travel and canceled big events or turned them into live streaming events.
So far, Adobe Inc (NASDAQ: ADBE) canceled its annual summit in Las Vegas, saying it would become an “online-only” experience. Apple has restricted employees from travel to China, Italy and South Korea and still didn’t reopen most of its China stores.
There are currently over 97,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19, with more than 3,300 deaths.
Stocks of the big tech are mostly falling premarket. Microsoft (MSFT) went down 2.41% to $162.27.
Amazon (AMZN) stock fell 1.92% to $36.93.
Apple (AAPL) went down by 2.26% to $286.30.
Alphabet‘s Google (GOOGL) plummeted by 1.69% to $1,292.50.
Facebook (FB) dropped 2.09% to $181.30 in premarket trading on Friday.
Experienced creative professional focusing on financial and political analysis, editing daily newspapers and news sites, economical and political journalism, consulting, PR and Marketing. Teuta’s passion is to create new opportunities and bring people together.
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