That is, after all, the purpose of a prompter response by businesses: to prevent severe imbalances from developing at their firms, which in the aggregate can turn into deep contractions if unchecked.
Across the euro area, the economy is gradually reopening as vaccination coverage continues to expand. In Ireland, thanks to the public health and community response, we can see light at the end of the tunnel. We expect the Irish economy to recover strongly in the second half of the year but uncertainty regarding the evolution of the pandemic remains.