A public health worker takes details from a man volunteering to be tested for COVID-19 in the bustling Kawangware market in Nairobi.
Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images
As COVID-19 cases continue to increase in Kenya, there is a looming threat for escalated disease and death due to the many people with chronic conditions.
Can social distancing and lockdown
can work in South Africa’s townships and informal settlements?
Getty Images
South Africa’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic was one of ‘intervene first and ask questions later’. Now is the time for government to state clearly what its strategic endgame is.
People, some wearing masks, enjoy a walk in a park in Rome as Italy, the first nation to impose a nationwide lockdown against the coronavirus, begins to reopen – slowly.
Franco Origlia/Getty Images
It’s possible to evaluate countries’ readiness to lift their lockdowns, based on how well they managed the first wave of the pandemic, and how ready they are for a digital economy.
A cashier works wearing a face mask in a supermarket on April 15, 2020 near Lyon.
Jean-Philippe Ksiazek/AFP
Emilie Counil, Ined (Institut national d'études démographiques) and Myriam Khlat, Ined (Institut national d'études démographiques)
In addition to the elderly and health workers, those holding front-line jobs are particularly exposed. Infection risk and aggravating co-morbidities could compound social inequalities in time of crisis.
The man in the ironed mask: French president Emmanuel Macron changed his policy on mask-wearing in April.
Ian Langsdon/EPA
There are two principles governments use to make public health decisions, and on mask-wearing they’re in direct conflict.
Community members wearing protective face masks as they queue for aid in Zandspruit informal settlement, north of Johannesburg.
Phill Magakoe/AFP via Getty Images
Wearing masks is being introduced in conjunction with maintaining a physical distance of at least 1.5 metres and following hygiene measures such as hand washing.
Some countries are making it work – and the rest could learn from them.
A worker from Sanctuary, a Christian charitable organization, tends to homeless people in their tents during the COVID-19 pandemic in Toronto on April 28, 2020.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette
Canadian and American religious groups are responding very differently to coronavirus public health measures. Why? In Canada, health care is more widely regarded as a public good and a right.
A health worker collecting sample test kits from a nurse during a community COVID-19 testing campaign in Lagos.
Photo by Olukayode Jaiyeola/NurPhoto via Getty Images
As Nigeria battles COVID-19, systemic corruption and a low level of accountability in the health sector may undermine efforts to halt the devastating effect of the virus.
Lockdowns to curb the coronavirus have shut down Africa’s dominant informal economy, destroying livelihoods.
Simon Maina/AFP/GettyImages
Katherine E. Gallagher, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine; Anthony Scott, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine; Ifedayo Adetifa, KEMRI Wellcome Trust Research Programme; John Ojal, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine; Shirine Voller, KEMRI Wellcome Trust Research Programme, and Wangeci Kagucia, KEMRI Wellcome Trust Research Programme
Coronavirus is a stark reminder of what a world without vaccines would look like.
Job seekers wait on the side of a road in South Africa. Joblessness stands at a record high.
Mujahid Safodien/AFP via Getty Images
Economic distress was the norm for many before the coronavirus outbreak. The pandemic is an opportunity to provide an economically secure future for all.
Bluetooth wireless communication makes it possible to track when people have been exposed to people infected with the coronavirus. The right cryptography scheme keeps alerts about exposures private.
The recognition that COVID-19 is accompanied by an equally alarming “infodemic” has added a level of complexity to the situation. What are the consequences of this avalanche of information?
Many ethical decisions will need to be made as patients seek treatment for Covid-19.
Health workers fill out documents before performing tests for COVID-19 at the screening and testing tents set up at the Charlotte Maxeke Hospital in Johannesburg.
Photo by Michele Spatari / AFP via Getty Images
Racism against fellow Indians and classism against the poor characterised India’s early response to coronavirus, that is reminiscent of British imperial public health policies.
Room lights in a hotel form the shape of a heart in Jakarta on April 25 2020. The lights were turned on as a symbol of support, gratitude and love for medical workers on the front line of handling the COVD-19 pandemic.
Rifqi Riyanto/INA Photo Agency/Sipa USA/AAP
Democracies such as the United States, Italy and Spain, as well as Indonesia, have so far failed to control the spread of the virus.
Anthony Fauci, left, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, speaks with Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, before testifying at a congressional hearing in March. Fauci has had a higher public profile during the coronavirus pandemic.
(AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
Those who work in the background to keep everyone healthy — public health nurses, health inspectors, laboratory techs and epidemiologists — deserve recognition in the fight against COVID-19.
Dean Faculty of Health Sciences and Professor of Vaccinology at University of the Witwatersrand; and Director of the SAMRC Vaccines and Infectious Diseases Analytics Research Unit, University of the Witwatersrand
Principal Medical Scientist and Head of Laboratory for Antimalarial Resistance Monitoring and Malaria Operational Research, National Institute for Communicable Diseases
Professor and Programme Director, SA MRC Centre for Health Economics and Decision Science - PRICELESS SA (Priority Cost Effective Lessons in Systems Strengthening South Africa), University of the Witwatersrand