Global response to COVID-19 in Africa must protect lives, livelihoods, and freedoms
By E. Gyimah-Boadi, Board Chairman and interim CEO of Afrobarometer, and Carolyn Logan, Director of Analysis for Afrobarometer
This blog is part of a series on tackling COVID-19 in developing countries. Visit the OECD dedicated page to access the OECD’s data, analysis and recommendations on the health, economic, financial and societal impacts of COVID-19 worldwide.
As COVID-19 gains a foothold on the continent, fears are growing that Africa’s fragile health-care systems and economies will provide little protection from the pandemic’s potential ravages. At the same time, trust in government institutions – one of the most critical resources needed to mount effective societal responses that depend on widespread public cooperation – is sorely lacking in many African countries. Concern is also growing that regimes that are either unscrupulous or desperate may take advantage of local fears and global pressures to place not just essential, temporary restrictions on public freedoms, but to roll back hard-won gains on a more permanent basis.
While citizens may be ill-equipped to speak or act in defense of their freedoms during an emerging crisis, perceptions that governments are abusing their powers and taking advantage of the situation could undermine public trust still further. Limiting the effects of the pandemic on Africa and saving lives requires an urgent global response. But the international community must also provide support in ways that strengthen, rather than undermine, Africans’ freedoms. Continue reading “Global response to COVID-19 in Africa must protect lives, livelihoods, and freedoms”
COVID-19 and beyond: How can Africa’s health systems cope?
By Riku Elovainio, Consultant in global health and social protection and Alexander Pick, OECD Development Centre
This blog is part of a series on tackling COVID-19 in developing countries. Visit the OECD dedicated page to access the OECD’s data, analysis and recommendations on the health, economic, financial and societal impacts of COVID-19 worldwide.
(The Covid-19 pandemic threatens to overwhelm health systems everywhere. With the virus now present in 52 African countries, will health systems in the region, many of which were under strain before the pandemic and have no reserve capacity, be able to cope? International support will be crucial in helping countries in Africa respond, but efforts to strengthen the region’s health services in the short term confront an array of obstacles that extend beyond the health sector itself. Even a crisis of these proportions should not obscure the long-term priorities for Africa’s health systems, on which depends its capacity to deal with day-to-day demand, let alone the next crisis.
The West African Ebola epidemic of 2014-2016 exposed the affected countries’ limited capacity to deal with a widespread disease outbreak. The lessons for health systems across Africa were understood yet have not prompted a step change in public health services, even in the countries where the Ebola crisis struck. While there is great variation across Africa (South Africa’s health system is clearly very different from South Sudan’s, for example), many countries exhibit the same gaps in their health systems that make it extremely difficult to scale up a short-term response.
Continue reading “COVID-19 and beyond: How can Africa’s health systems cope?”
Avec ou sans, pendant et après le Covid-19, priorité aux réformes des systèmes de santé et d’éducation en Afrique de l’Ouest
Par Gilles Yabi, fondateur de WATHI, think tank citoyen de l’Afrique de l’Ouest
Ce blog fait partie d’une série sur la lutte contre le COVID-19 dans les pays en voie de développement. Visitez la page dédiée de l’OCDE pour accéder aux données, analyses et recommandations de l’OCDE sur les impacts sanitaires, économiques, financiers et sociétaux de COVID-19 dans le monde.
En Afrique de l’Ouest, les impacts de Covid-19 seront-ils catastrophiques ? La crise Ebola a révélé la très grande faiblesse des systèmes sanitaires des pays touchés à l’époque dans la région, Liberia, Sierra Leone et Guinée principalement. Si des enseignements importants ont été tirés, avec la mise en place de centres dédiés aux urgences sanitaires dans plusieurs pays, les systèmes de santé dans leur ensemble ne se sont pas particulièrement renforcés. Les ménages assument l’essentiel des dépenses de santé par rapport aux États, les inégalités d’accès aux soins sont frappantes, et les hôpitaux manquent cruellement de personnel qualifié, de matériel, de dispositif de maintenance des équipements et de médicaments, ainsi que de capacités d’accueil et, parfois, de salubrité. La crise du coronavirus exacerbera sans doute la situation. Il est plus que jamais primordial de renforcer et d’investir dans les systèmes de santé, sans quoi la plupart des pays d’Afrique de l’Ouest ne pourront faire face ni aux crises sanitaires, comme celle du Covid-19, ni aux nombreuses autres maladies infectieuses ou chroniques.
COVID-19: consequences for international migration and development
By Jason Gagnon, Development economist, OECD Development Centre
This blog is part of a series on tackling COVID-19 in developing countries. Visit the OECD dedicated page to access the OECD’s data, analysis and recommendations on the health, economic, financial and societal impacts of COVID-19 worldwide.
While the COVID-19 pandemic is not a migration issue, it is being viewed and managed as one. Fear-exploiting rhetoric around the crisis could provide the political space to push structural anti-migration policies through. This would be detrimental to the rights and health of migrants, and the positive impact migrants have on development – in 2017, an estimated 258 million international migrants filled labour shortages and contributed to transferring much needed skills, goods and services around the globe.
We have made remarkable strides to strengthen migration governance but if migrants’ rights are not protected in the short and long-term response to the COVID-19 crisis, progress could unravel, putting migrants and their families, as well as some of the foundations of our global economy at risk. Continue reading “COVID-19: consequences for international migration and development”
Latin America and the Caribbean in the time of COVID-19: Preventing the vulnerable from falling behind
By Federico Bonaglia, Deputy Director, OECD Development Centre, and Sebastian Nieto Parra, Head of Latin America and the Caribbean Unit, OECD Development Centre
This blog is part of a series on tackling COVID-19 in developing countries.
The necessary containment measures against COVID-19 have engendered an unprecedented global economic crisis, combining supply and demand side shocks. Now, the pandemic is affecting Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and countries are bracing for the ripple effects. Just months ago, many countries in the region experienced a wave of mass protests driven by deep social discontent, frustrated aspirations, persistent vulnerability and growing poverty. The crisis will exacerbate these problems.
Beyond the magnitude of the impacts on already weak health systems – some 125 million people still lack access to basic health services – the overwhelming socioeconomic impact of the crisis could disproportionately fall on vulnerable and poor households if ambitious policy responses are not put in place.
Continue reading “Latin America and the Caribbean in the time of COVID-19: Preventing the vulnerable from falling behind”From Social Distancing to Social Solidarity: Gig economy and the Covid-19
By Funda Ustek-Spilda, Mark Graham, Alessio Bertolini, Srujana Katta, Fabian Ferrari and Kelle Howson – A coalition of researchers at Fairwork – an organisation which studies the work practices and working conditions in the emerging gig economy. Fairwork is based at the Oxford Internet Institute.
This blog is part of a series on tackling COVID-19 in developing countries. Visit the OECD dedicated page to access the OECD’s data, analysis and recommendations on the health, economic, financial and societal impacts of COVID-19 worldwide.
Social distancing and self-isolation are the policies du jour. At this point, an estimated 1.7 billion people have been asked to remain at home by their governments, whether through a full lock-down or similar measures. As people are required to self-isolate and minimise social contact, using the internet and online platforms has become the safest way to access necessary goods and services. It is therefore not surprising that “gig workers” – workers that digital platforms hire on a per-service (“gig”) basis – have been identified as “key workers” in the fight against Covid-19, be it delivering household necessities or performing services, such as stocking shelves in supermarkets or caring for the elderly or disabled.
Nevertheless, due to the nature of their jobs, gig workers have been identified as the highest risk group as they cannot always ensure keeping a 2 m social distance from their customers. Also, our interviews show that many gig workers live hand to mouth, and they just cannot afford to take time off, whether there is a public health crisis or not. Moreover, some workers have leases and other upfront payments that they have committed to make to the platforms they work for, and they are simply unable to hold off work until they raise what they owe. It is worth noting that the gig economy also relies on workers in developing countries where overall most workers are informal and very often lack safety nets and other forms of protection. In brief, Covid-19 has brought to light a major inequality in the way platform economies are set up: gig workers provide for the key needs of society, yet they do not have access to fair working conditions. Continue reading “From Social Distancing to Social Solidarity: Gig economy and the Covid-19”
Covid-19: time to unleash the power of international co-operation
By Mario Pezzini, former Director, OECD Development Centre and Special Advisor to the OECD Secretary General on Development
This blog* is part of a series on tackling COVID-19 in developing countries. Visit the OECD dedicated page to access the OECD’s data, analysis and recommendations on the health, economic, financial and societal impacts of COVID-19 worldwide.
The rapid spread of the dire human, social and economic impacts of the coronavirus crisis shows just how interconnected we are. International co-operation has become –literally– vital.
A health crisis has set off a global economic crisis, where shocks on the demand and supply sides are combining in an unprecedented scenario. Many developing countries are bracing themselves. While Europe is struggling to contain and cope with a spiralling number of cases and fatalities, the effects in countries where health systems are already weak, economies are highly dependent on global demand, and strict containment policies are more difficult to implement, could be even more disastrous.
Major outbreaks in developing countries could cause the collapse of weak health systems and expose gaps in social protection programmes, especially in Africa, where so many schemes rely on official development assistance. A humanitarian crisis may be in the making: travel restrictions affect the delivery of humanitarian assistance, and infections in refugee camps – largely hosted in developing countries – will be difficult to fight. The ILO estimates that 25 million jobs could be lost worldwide, possibly more, as the majority of workers in developing countries are in the informal economy. Continue reading “Covid-19: time to unleash the power of international co-operation”
To be it, girls and boys need to see it
By Gabriela Bucher, Chief Operating Officer, Plan International
Why representation is key to eliminating gender-based violence.
We entered Women’s Month during a landmark year for girls’ and women’s rights, when a number of hallmark standards for women’s human rights globally — from the Beijing Declaration to the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 — are being reviewed and renewed. But decades after these agreements were signed, millions of girls and women remain subject to gender-based violence. 84 million girls worldwide are trapped in child marriages and subject to intimate partner violence. 3 million girls are still at risk of undergoing female genital mutilation (FGM) every year. It’s time for drastic action.
Gender-based violence is rooted in outdated, entrenched and deeply harmful attitudes about gender that pervade in our societies. The Social Institutions and Gender Index shows that intimate partner violence, for example, is higher in countries where it is most socially accepted. To eliminate gender-based violence around the world we must tackle the problem at its source by unpicking harmful gender norms, beginning at an early age and empowering young people to becoming ambassadors for gender equality within their own communities. Continue reading “To be it, girls and boys need to see it”
Lessons from coronavirus for the future of ‘aid’
By Jonathan Glennie, Senior Fellow, Joep Lange Institute
This blog is part of a series on tackling COVID-19 in developing countries. Visit the OECD dedicated page to access the OECD’s data, analysis and recommendations on the health, economic, financial and societal impacts of COVID-19 worldwide.
In December 2019 cases of a little-known disease called coronavirus were reported in Wuhan, a city in China with a population of about 11 million. As of 20 January 2020 there were 282 confirmed cases of the virus, 278 of which originated in China. Less than three months later, over 3,400 people in Italy were dead. Countries all over the world are gearing up for long periods of lockdown as a global pandemic takes hold. If ever proof were needed that health concerns in one country require a co-ordinated and well-funded global response, this is it.
What does this tell us about the future of global cooperation? The next chapter in the story of the China−Italy coronavirus relationship is equally relevant. On 13 March China sent a planeload of experts and medical supplies to Italy, including masks and respirators. Italy is one of the world’s richest countries (average income, US$34,480); despite rapid advance over the past decades, China is still much poorer (average income, US$9,770).
Continue reading “Lessons from coronavirus for the future of ‘aid’”
The coming of age of triangular co-operation
By Jorge Moreira da Silva, Director of the Development Co-operation Directorate, OECD, and Jorge Chediek, Special Envoy of the UN Secretary General for South-South Co-operation and Director of the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation (UNOSSC)
Triangular co-operation is when actors from both developing and developed countries come together, often with international organisations, civil society and private sector partners, to deliver innovative and co-created development solutions. A niche issue for many years, it is now taking centre stage in the global discourse.
Continue reading “The coming of age of triangular co-operation”