Page 9 - Nile Explorer Issue 12

and his native Mexico. Policy interventions to mitigate
But everyone is not on board. The
United States, China and Russia have
declined to help with COVAX financing. the impact of COVID-19 Pandemic
And while Canada and the EU have
been generous donors to global efforts, on economic growth and enhance
we are also undermining those efforts by
Perhaps if the moral argument can’t resilience to future shocks
hoarding supply.
win over solidarity, the public health
argument will. Eradicating COVID-19
everywhere is an epidemiological William Hynes
necessity. OECD’s Acting Head of the New Approaches to Economic
“Until everybody is protected, Challenges Unit, France.
nobody can be safe. We are living in
an interconnected world and even if
those countries can protect themselves,
they will be living on an island,” said
Dr. Richard Mihingo, the coordinator
of Immunization and Vaccine
Development at the World Health
Organization (WHO) Africa region.
Medical experts and scientists in
Africa remember the decades-long,
pain-staking fight to access life-saving
drugs to combat HIV/Aids long after
they were available in the West. More
recently, despite lip service on global
solidarity, the H1N1 flu vaccine arrived
in Africa many months after the height
of the epidemic in 2009. There are ample Image of coronavirus
examples from our distant past, but also
contemporary days of life-saving drugs A gradual shift toward investments and profitability and apparent efficiency. The
made available to the wealthy but not to net exports, and the move away from disastrous consequences of COVID-19
the poor. private consumption resulted in over show that resilience must become a core
As we race to put this pandemic behind 50% of Africa’s GDP growth as of 2019. philosophy within system management
us and return to normalcy, we are A tremendous improvement for the first and operations to ensure we are able
to continue to function in the midst of
time in a decade. However, this was
reminded of the world’s haves and have- publicised by the African Development disruptions from COVID-19. The policy
not. While we move full steam ahead Bank in January 2020 before the response should be twofold: address
on our vaccination distribution plans COVID-19 pandemic hit Africa. immediate concerns, and propose an
here in Canada, I’ve been thinking a lot Now Africa’s economic growth is approach to dealing with the longer-
about what that “normal” is and how we anticipated to recover to 3% in 2021 term issues the pandemic highlights.
seem so casually comfortable with past from -3.4% in 2020, provided that In the short-term, that means identifying
inequalities and easing right back to governments manage the COVID-19 the people and activities most affected,
them. infection rate well. The African assessing how measures to help them
Did I expect this virus to result in our Economic Outlook 2020 – Supplement will impact others, and underlining
world leaders and wealthiest citizens maintains that the growth outlook for that difficult trade-offs between health,
sitting around the campfire singing 2021 and beyond would depend on economic, social, and other goals
Kumbaya together? Of course not. policies to reopen economies. are inevitable. In the longer-term, an
But did I perhaps think these The COVID-19 crisis highlights the dire approach that reacts to the systemic
unprecedented past several months of consequences of failing to appreciate and origins and impacts of major shocks is
extreme loss, sacrifice and pain on such manage the characteristics of complex needed if policies are to be effective.
a mass scale would cause some inner global systems. Resilience, or the ability The COVID-19 crisis also shows how
reflection, and an internal shift in all of to recover from and adapt to unexpected important it is to keep resources in
threats, has been a focus of specific parts
reserve for times when unexpected
us to strive to be better global citizens, of our system; for instance military and upheavals in the system prevent it from
and see this is an opportunity to balance public health authorities. functioning normally (and the argument
some of the scales of inequity, maybe I But the notions of viability and resilience can be made for not depleting natural
did - naively so. can be in tension with short-term resources).

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