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Blog post
The dangers of not knowing enough about COVID-19’s impact on women in Pakistan
The Government of Pakistan has begun publishing gender-disaggregated data on COVID-19 at a national level. One graph on the government’s Covid-19 website illustrates that men constitute 74% of observed cases so far (as of June 29th 2020). This is a significant aberration compared to worldwide trends and is one of the highest proportions globally. A WHO report on Gender...
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Blog post
Closing gender gaps in Bihar: Examining the state’s budgets for women and girls
Economic growth unaccompanied by inclusive, equitable and sustainable growth can not only exacerbate future gender equality outcomes, but also prove regressive by pushing progress on gender equality back. In Bihar, a state that has witnessed a steady and high economic growth over the last decade, we look at how much budgets are being allocated to achieve gender equality and...
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Blog post
In defence of density
At their core, cities are absences of space between people. You can call it density, closeness, or proximity; it is the opposite of distance. The on-going COVID-19 pandemic has brought this core feature of cities under question. But this criticism paints with a broad brush: what matters are the type of density and the way it is managed. The type of density Density alone...
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Blog post
COVID-19 in Tanzania: Is business as usual response enough?
Tanzania’s unconventional approach to COVID-19 may be slow in response and may lack direction, but its uniqueness illustrates the need for governments to form context-specific smart containment strategies and recovery plans. To maintain multiple competing priorities, the Tanzanian government can increase public health funding to local health centres to implement mass...
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Blog post
How clean hands can save lives during the COVID-19 pandemic
Handwashing with soap is the first line of defence against COVID-19. But without active support to improve water, sanitation and hygiene, the world is much more likely to experience prolonged and repeated pandemics. On June 1st, 9-year-old Stephen Wamukota received the Kenyan presidential award for inventing a pedal-operated hand-washing machine. The contraption, fashioned...
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Blog post
Using e-governance data to improve public service delivery: Evidence from land record changes in Bangladesh
Improving monitoring and evaluation information flows in government bureaucracies can improve service delivery even without explicit incentive structures Studies have shown that better incentive structures for civil servants improve the way they provide public services (Finan et al. 2017). However, due to political constraints it is often difficult to introduce...
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Blog post
Projecting the impact of COVID-19 on exports in Ethiopia
Agriculture exports will likely be the hardest hit, impacting poor rural livelihoods most. Domestic demand needs to be stimulated and protected. Ethiopia is the second most populous country in Africa, home to more than 110 million people and one of the fastest growing economies. Growth averaged more than 10% annually over the past decade and a half, leading to substantial...
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Blog post
Making policy decisions under uncertainty
The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed policymakers to high levels of uncertainty: governments simply do not have enough information to know what to do. The result is changing policy decisions mid-course: Britain reversed its strategy of building herd immunity when a new estimate put the likely death toll from this strategy at 250,000 people; America’s Centres for Disease...
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Blog post
Ramping up early detection of COVID-19 with limited resources: The role of pool testing
The ability to rapidly detect COVID-19 is central to saving lives and protecting livelihoods. However, testing equipment and associated kits are expensive and in short supply. As a result, many countries are not conducting anywhere near enough tests. Worse still, many individuals are spreading the virus unknowingly and undetected. The situation is particularly acute in...
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Blog post
Empowering our cities to fight the pandemics of the future
Members of the Cities that Work council come together to delineate the critical challenges that need to be addressed to equip our cities to withstand pandemics. Cities accomplish many wonderful things - they enable people to exchange ideas, goods and services, and many other forms of collaboration. However, the fact that they serve as international and national...
Blog post
The dangers of not knowing enough about COVID-19’s impact on women in Pakistan
The Government of Pakistan has begun publishing gender-disaggregated data on COVID-19 at a national level. One graph on the government’s Covid-19 website illustrates that men constitute 74% of observed cases so far (as of June 29th 2020). This is a significant aberration compared to worldwide trends and is one of the highest proportions globally. A WHO report on Gender...