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                                                                                       Tuesday
                                                                                      September 15, 2020                        Week
                                                                                      T: 582-7800
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                 A r u b a ’ s   O N L Y   E n g l i s h   n e w s p a p e r
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               Wildfires during pandemic intensify economic pain in West




            Smoke from wildfires fills the sky over Pasadena, Calif., in this view looking east down Colorado Boulevard in a Saturday, Sept. 12, 2020 file photo.
                                                                                                                                            Associated Press

            By PAUL WISEMAN                                 could  top  the  unprecedented  $13  billion  re-  of dollars, not in hundreds of billions or trillions.
            The  fires  consuming  the  forests  of  California  corded in 2017 when the state was hit by three  To make a nationwide impact, Kamins said, it
            and Oregon and darkening the skies over San  of the five costliest fires in U.S. history.       would take something like Hurricane Katrina in
            Francisco  and  Portland  are  also  damaging  a  "We know that the damage is widespread, but  2005, which disrupted oil supplies. But the eco-
            regional economy already singed by the coro-    we  don't  really  know  how  many  homes,  how  nomic pain will be intense in areas decimated
            navirus outbreak.                               many  structures  have  been  destroyed,"  said  by  fire,  especially  poor  towns  in  rural  Oregon
            Wildfires  are  destroying  property,  running  up  Adam Kamins, an economist who tracks natu-  and California, piling on at a time when many
            huge  losses  for  property  insurers  and  putting  ral disasters for Moody's Analytics. "I imagine the  businesses  have  already  succumbed  to  the
            a  strain  on  economic  activity  along  the  West  number is going to be an unbearably high one.''  pandemic-induced  recession.  U.S.  economic
            Coast that could linger for a year or more.     The fires are unlikely to make much of a dent in  activity  collapsed  at  a  record  31.7%  annual
            The  credit  rating  agency  A.M.  Best  estimates  the overall $20 trillion U.S. economy. The finan-  pace from April through June.
            that insured losses from the blazes in California  cial fallout will be measured in the low billions                     Continued on next page
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