Myanmar Is a Failing State—and Could Be a Danger to Its Neighbors

By Joshua Kurlantzick, CFR Expert Since the Myanmar military seized power in February, it has overseen economic collapse, mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic, murdered hundreds of people, and set the stage for the state to fail. What is the state of the COVID-19 outbreak in Myanmar? Horrendous. When the new coronavirus emerged, Myanmar remained relatively unaffected: Until August 2020, it had recorded only six COVID-19 deaths, and development specialists praised the civilian government, led by the National League for Democracy (NLD), for implementing measures to limit the virus’s spread. Despite a wave of infections in late 2020, Myanmar had reported a total of just three thousand COVID-19 deaths before the coup. Today, the military government claims that Myanmar is suffering an average of six thousand new cases and three hundred deaths per day. The actual numbers are likely much higher, as the few tests available have at times yielded a 37 percent positivity rate. (Testing almost completely stopped in the aftermath of the coup and has slowly picked back up.) The country lacks doctors, bottled oxygen, vaccine doses, and medications. Only about 8 percent of the population has received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose. Doctors Without Borders reports that the country is suffering “uncontrolled community spread,” and the highly contagious Delta variant is moving through Myanmar, although there is not enough information to know how big a role Delta is playing in Myanmar’s caseload. How bad is the economy? More on:Myanmar COVID-19 Human RightsSoutheast Asia Prior to the pandemic, the economy was on track to expand by an additional 6 percent in 2019–20. Now, the economy is imploding. Many banks have little cash and many multinational companies have left Myanmar as trade relations have soured between leading democracies and the country. Myanmar lost 1.2 million jobs in the second quarter of 2021. In July, the World Bank projected that the economy would contract by 18 percent this year. Richard Horsey of the International Crisis Group told the UN Security Council in April that Myanmar “stands on the brink of state failure.” How did Myanmar collapse so quickly The military, which dominated Myanmar between 1962 and 2010, seized control this past February because it feared that the NLD-led government had become powerful enough to loosen the army’s control over defense portfolios and army-run conglomerates. In its zeal to quell all forms of dissent, the junta dismantled many important state sectors. Some doctors and nurses joined the postcoup resistance movement, leading the armed forces to seize health-care institutions and arrest health workers. The regime has jailed NLD leaders and civil society members, and shot live ammunition into people’s homes. The brutality has led tens of thousands of Myanmar citizens to flee to other parts of the country and abroad. Desperate, the parallel National Unity Government openly declared war on the junta earlier this month.