/CNW/ - Today, we re proud to announce the launch of the Partnership for Health System Sustainability and Resilience (PHSSR) in Canada. Pre-pandemic, many.
Governments need to plan and can no longer pretend to have been taken by surprise, again Frontliners transport the coffin of a Lebanese Christian woman who died of the COVID-19 disease. Image Credit: AFP
Lebanon has lost to coronavirus in two days the same number of lives the country lost in last year’s catastrophic explosion at the Beirut port, which caused a global outcry and emergency help from dozens of countries, including makeshift hospitals, medical kits and staff and significant financial and food aid.
Lebanon has been in total lockdown for the past month, which is supposed to be eased, partially on Monday. On Thursday and Friday, 190 people died of Covid-19 complications as the health system seems to have collapsed under the increasing number of daily cases, which reached record level in the past few weeks around 3,000 daily in a country of 6 million people.
Policewoman directs traffic in downtown Lima during the quarantine in Peru. Photo: Victor Idrogo / World Bank
As countries prepare for COVID-19 immunization campaigns, it is equally important to look back at the past months and examine what policy interventions worked in the health sector, what did not work and what can be done better.
Disrupted global supply chains, limited knowledge of the disease, lack of information and weak monitoring systems were some of the reasons health systems were mostly “flying blind” at the onset of the pandemic in March of 2020. But this no longer needs to be the case – understanding what interventions worked in what context may help countries chart a course forward and mitigate future outbreaks of the disease as they roll out vaccine distribution.