Africa was predicted to be hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, given its poor health systems. However, this outcome has not been the case. Despite the U.S. being the highest spender on health care globally, COVID-19 has shown that its primary care infrastructure is in much need of strengthening. But we should not mistake COVID-19 as the biggest pandemic of our time. If anything, it is only a dry run, with other epidemics brewing on the horizon. Therefore, if the global community is serious about epidemic preparedness, global health security, and protecting the most vulnerable, we need to redesign health systems for resilience. Africa’s lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as from concurrent outbreaks of cholera, Ebola virus disease, yellow fever, and chikungunya, could provide a roadmap.

As Beijing prepares to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, China’s environmental activities are once again on center stage. The Wilson Center’s China Environment Forum took the top spot this month with Karen Mancl and Richard Liu’s coverage of the new program report, “Closing the Loop on China’s Water Pollution,” which details what China can learn from New York, Washington, D.C., and Singapore, to advance its wastewater and carbon reduction targets.

“Africa, as you all know, is one of the most resource-rich regions of the world,” said Cyril Obi, Program Director of the African Peacebuilding Network at the Social Science Research Council. “But many observers have noted that in spite of all this natural wealth, Africa seems to have quite a substantial proportion of its population living under poverty.” He spoke at a recent Wilson Center Africa Program event that examined the relationship between natural resources, sustainable development, and peace in Africa. How do you explain a continent rich with natural resources where so many people live in poverty, he asked.   

Our collective development objectives will not be achieved if they come at the expense of biodiversity and natural resource management, said Jeff Haeni, Acting Deputy Assistant Administrator in the Bureau for Economic Growth, Education, and Environment at USAID. He spoke at a recent Wilson Center virtual event, co-hosted with USAID, that explored the links between conservation and public health with examples from USAID’s BRIDGE project, which aims to build the evidence base for integrating biodiversity conservation considerations into policy discussions and decision-making across sectors. “The ability of societies around the world to develop and thrive is dependent on the health of the forests, fisheries, and natural systems around them,” he said.

Weeks before most of the world began to take the spread of COVID-19 seriously, Africa was already threatened by another plague, the biggest locust outbreak in the last 70 years. Locusts swarmed into Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Uganda, and South Sudan in January and February this year. Those hordes of voracious locusts laid eggs, and now the second wave, 20 times the size of the first group, is arriving. According to Locust Watch, “The current situation in East Africa remains extremely alarming as more swarms form and mature in northern and central Kenya, southern Ethiopia, and probably in Somalia.”

The coronavirus pandemic has people throughout the world pondering how humankind should respond to a public health crisis. While individual countries are managing the crisis with varying degrees of success, we can all agree that the Covid-19 pandemic is commanding the international community’s attention. By contrast, it is much harder to get the world to care about the long-term public health crisis unfolding in the West African Sahel.

“African countries are facing a severe health crisis. As of this morning, there are 14,573 confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 790 deaths in 52 out of 54 countries,” said Judd Devermont, director the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Africa Program, at an April 13th event on the impacts of Covid-19 in Africa. The World Health Organization has estimated a 5 percent drop in Africa’s GDP and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) believes that as many as 20 million jobs will be lost. There is also a political dimension to this crisis, as governments struggle to deliver services, provide safety and security, and allow people to continue livelihoods, said Judd.

As the global climate changes, climate-related security risks are making the existing political, social, and economic challenges even more complicated. The 230 million people who live in the Horn of Africa are highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change such as droughts and floods. Political fragility and transnational complexities make water governance a matter of regional high-level politics as well as geopolitical tensions. In short, sustainable water governance is critical for achieving resilient peace.