Only 6.2 million light-duty vehicles were sold worldwide in January—the lowest monthly figure since January 2012, which saw 5.9 million units sold, according to GlobalData, a data and analytics company. Driving the drop in sales was the emergence in December 2019 of the coronavirus (COVID-19) in Wuhan, China. The disease has spread rapidly and has already infected more than 95,000 people and caused at least 3,285 deaths worldwide (2,902 in China), according to the latest tally by Johns Hopkins CSSE. To avoid becoming infected, consumers in China and other exposed regions have employed strict outbreak-control measures, with many barricading themselves at home until the danger subsides. This has created a knock-on effect for both vehicle sales and production, with dealerships devoid of customers and factories at a standstill with no one to operate them. While the drop in January vehicle sales on a global scale is alarming, sinking 13.9% […]