COVID-19 response: mitigating negative impacts on other areas of health

Abstract

‘Vertical’ responses focused primarily on preventing and containing COVID-19 have been implemented in countries around the world with negative consequences for other health services, people’s access to and use of them, and associated health outcomes, especially in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). ‘Lockdowns’ and restrictive measures, especially, have complicated service provision and access, and disrupted key supply chains. Such interventions, alongside more traditional public health measures, interact with baseline health, health system, and social and economic vulnerabilities in LMICs to compound negative impacts. This analysis, based on a rapid evidence assessment by the Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform in mid-2020, highlights the drivers and evidence of these impacts, emphasises the additional vulnerabilities experienced by marginalised social groups, and provides insight for governments, agencies, organisations and communities to implement more proportionate, appropriate, comprehensive and socially just responses that address COVID-19 in the context of and alongside other disease burdens. In the short term, there is an urgent need to monitor and mitigate impacts of pandemic responses on health service provision, access and use, including through embedding COVID-19 response within integrated health systems approaches. These efforts should also feed into longer-term strategies to strengthen health systems, expand universal healthcare coverage and attend to the social determinants of health—commitments, both existing and new—which governments, donors and international agencies must make and be held accountable to. Crucially, affected communities must be empowered to play a central role in identifying health priorities, allocating resources, and designing and delivering services.

Protecting and Promoting Systems for Essential Health Services During Rollout of COVID-19 Tools

“…An analysis, based on a rapid evidence assessment by the Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform, on mitigating negative impacts on other areas of health emphasises the additional vulnerabilities experienced by marginalised social groups, including people living with disabilities (Hrynick et al, 2021). In the short-term, there is a need to embed the COVID-19 response within integrated health systems approaches feeding into longer-term strategies to strengthen health systems, expand universal health care coverage and address the social determinants of health.…”

COVID-19 raises a health and human rights imperative to advance a UN Convention on the Rights of Older Persons

“… 1 Reversing recent gains in longevity, the world has confronted an unprecedented loss of elders in the pandemic, with case-fatality rates rising with both age and the presence of underlying immunological, cardiovascular and respiratory conditions common in older age. 2 Emerging data reveal that the risk of hospitalisation and death from COVID-19 increases rapidly with chronological age. In many countries, a disproportionate share of deaths related to COVID-19 has been linked to long-term care facilities, which have offered inadequate disease prevention and treatment to older persons.…”

COVID-19: an ‘extraterrestrial’ disease?

“…For the first time in history, billions of people were locked down, denied the right to go to school or to earn their living, and/or to see their loved ones, while an unprecedented race for treatment and vaccine discovery was launched. The collateral damage of these response measures were largely ignored, even if they may be greater than the positive effects of the counter-measures (Hrynick et al, 2021). The collateral damage ranged from economic recession and loss of education, to increased domestic violence, mental health problems, and the worsening of chronic conditions from a lack of access to care (Bavli et al, 2020).…”