How Can Countries Prepare for Another Pandemic?

No matter where you were located across the world, the COVID-19 pandemic likely upended your life and the lives of those around you. Some of the longest lockdowns globally occurred right here in Australia, with Victoria’s Stage 4 lockdown considered one of the toughest lockdowns seen to date, and it served as a stark reminder of the deep need for resilient health systems to serve our communities.

While years later, we continue to reel from the effects of COVID-19, public health officials and other experts, such as those who have relevant degrees like a master of public health, have used this time to learn from everything that occurred in 2019 and put in place measures to prepare us for the next global pandemic. Below, we list out three strategies and focus areas needed to give the world a leg up the next time disaster hits.

Prioritise healthcare workers and shore up emergency procedures

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, frontline health workers stood up and kept the healthcare system afloat. From taking care of the sick, testing and reporting cases, or administering vaccines, they kept the healthcare services going when it was needed most. It is clear that when facing potential future outbreaks, countries that have invested in their healthcare sector through recruitment, training, and ongoing support of their workers will come out in front.

Before even dealing with the health consequences of a pandemic, however, it is important that the surveillance and reporting systems used to respond to and contain infectious diseases are in place. Broadly, clinicians, public health practitioners, and labs around the world send disease reports to groups like the World Health Organisation’s Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network, where the data is aggregated to help identify outbreaks of new infectious diseases and their pandemic potential. If a pathogen does begin to spread, governments should have emergency management systems in place to respond. A simple way to be prepared for a future pandemic is to ensure these systems remain stable with continued funding, training, and adequate personnel to ensure a rapid global response even when there is no threat on the horizon.

Prepare the general public

Another major component of reducing the spread of disease comes from an effective and compliant pandemic response from the general public. Communication is key here, and providing a consistent voice and actionable message that clearly explains the importance of every individual’s role in curbing the spread of a pandemic is critical.

This kind of guidance is most effective if it can be tailored to different audiences. During COVID-19, it was discovered that confusion can easily occur when lockdown requirements differ from state to state and in different socio-economic areas. In the US, for example, areas in the South with a deep distrust of testing and vaccination efforts by the government and healthcare providers were directly linked to language barriers and immigration concerns.

Being prepared with an “all community” approach ensures everyone within the affected population is engaged and on board. This can be achieved by improving access to information and resources to ensure equality across the population, and building relationships with appropriate community leaders and influencers to help tailor and spread the correct information and foster trust in science. This ideally will be easier in a post-COVID-19 world, where the sudden, drastic lifestyle changes like the use of face masks in public and changing vaccination requirements will be considered somewhat the norm.

Improve access to vaccines

Developing, delivering, and then administering the COVID-19 vaccines was a logistical challenge during the pandemic. Supplies were also dwindling, and not just the vaccine itself; protective gear, including gloves and masks, were also in short supply, as well as cold chain storage solutions to ensure the vaccine was stored at the correct temperature.

Refining these processes is vital to better manage potential future outbreaks. Vaccines are the primary defence against outbreaks, and prioritising the distribution of them is a must. To further protect communities post an outbreak, plans should be made for the vaccine to become readily available at a community level via routine immunisation packages. This requires expanding and strengthening routine immunisation processes in healthcare facilities to be able to serve adults while protecting childhood immunisation.

Vaccine administration was a challenge during the COVID-19 pandemic. Photo by CDC on Unsplash.

A time to reflect

The COVID-19 pandemic offered a significant learning curve for the healthcare sector, the general public, and other impacted industries globally. While its legacy for many will likely be reflected upon as a period of darkness and despair, it should also be viewed as a time of monumental change that helped shape the future of healthcare systems across the world, and its aid in the management and even prevention of future outbreaks and pandemics.