First lessons from government evaluations of COVID-19 responses: A synthesis

Abstract

Evaluations provide critical tools to support real-time sharing of lessons on what is working, what is not, what could work and for whom. Despite the significant time and resource constraints that they were facing at the height of the COVID-19 crisis, governments understood this need to draw lessons from their policy responses to the pandemic. By April 2021, most countries in the sample analysed in this paper had already conducted evaluations on each of the key stages of the risk management cycle: preparedness, crisis management, and response and recovery.These first evaluations show that many governments came to similar conclusions, thus allowing us to identify important insights that can both feed into ongoing policy responses to the COVID-19 crisis and iimprove future resilience. In particular, the evaluations analysed in this paper underline that: Pandemic preparedness was generally insufficient, particularly in light of the major human and financial costs associated with global health crises similar to the COVID-19 pandemic. Governments took swift and massive action to mitigate the economic and financial effects of the pandemic, but should carefully monitor the longer-term budgetary costs of these measures. Trust requires transparency, not only through frequent and targeted crisis communication, but, more importantly, by engaging stakeholders and the public in risk-related decision-making.Important gaps remain in the evidence base available to date, however, and would warrant further investigation: There is insufficient evidence on critical sectors' preparedness for pandemics, whereas early evaluations suggest that they were crucial to an effective crisis response. The effectiveness of lockdown and restriction measures should probably be further assessed, given their impacts on individual liberties. It is worth exploring the impact of lockdowns on domestic violence, alcohol consumption, youth, and mental health.Finally, issues relating to policies' proportionality and coherence are still largely under-explored by these first evaluations, despite their usefulness for policy debate, particularly when resources are scarce and cross-government co-ordination is crucial. 12 13Learning from the global financial crisis, countries massively deployed measures aimed at supporting self-employed workers.To minimise the social impacts of the crisis, countries had to implement policies targeted at the most disadvantaged groups in society.Countries encountered important implementation challenges in mitigating the health impacts of the crisis. 14Countries were quick to close their border and implement travel restrictions, but encountered issues with coherence of, and compliance with, lockdown measures.

Strengthening Health Systems

“…Basic real-time data was missing for decision-makers at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic; for example, surveillance data on cases and deaths was often missing or misleading. The lack of real-time data on intensive care beds was also a major challenge (OECD, 2022b). Few countries were able to report the maximum occupancy for the 2022 Health at a Glance: Europe publication (OECD & European Union, 2022).…”

More resilient public administrations after COVID-19

“…While trust levels in governments in EU MS slightly increased to 40% in 2020 at the peak of the pandemic, trust went back to pre-crisis level at 34% of citizens trusting their national governments at the end of 2021 (EU, 2022 [5]). This calls for strengthening the resilience of public institutions but also for "building back better" by ensuring that key drivers of trust, such as citizen engagement, openness and effective and citizen-centred service delivery, are further embedded in new, more resilient governance models (OECD, 2022 [6]).…”

“…This has been the case of the Slovak Ministry of Environment that is elaborating a new partnership management strategy. The further engagement of citizens and civil society in the design and implementation of policies and services has been accelerating during the crisis thanks to new digital channels, collaboration mechanisms and partnerships and is a key driver for modernising the public administration, increasing its responsiveness to citizen needs, and ultimately reinforcing trust in the public administration (OECD, 2022 [6]).…”

Improving decision making through policy evaluation in Belgium

“…The covid crisis has also shone a light on structural and social problems, including the erosion of public trust in government and expert opinion. In a context of growing mis-and dis-information, governments' capacities to make evidence-informed decisions is thus vital to building citizens' trust in public institutions (OECD, 2022 [1]) Public policy evaluations can contribute to every government decision, from the design and implementation of long-term strategies, to budgets and resource allocation, and the impact assessment of new laws and regulations. (OECD, 2022 [2]).…”