I'm sure no one in the chip industry died (or got sick). And no one in an industry that supplies chips. And no one in an industry that buys chips. And no one in a service industry that services the employees of the above industries.

/s.

Its global. Its everywhere. Every industry will have impact simply due to huge disruptions to everyone. Tons of people got died, and many more got sick, and subject to lockdowns, and saw their purchase patterns change (eg. toilet paper). Directly, the IC industry changed when people had to purchase laptops and monitors and webcams for their at-home employees. That is a huge surge in demand that was a 1-time thing, but all those office supply orders are still depressed, so anyone making things has to re-tool their factory.

How can you be so sure about that? COVID, either by first-order effects or by second-order effects, is affecting almost everything in the world right now, why not the chip shortage too?