Assessing South Asia’s Pandemic Prevention and Response

With this commission the World Bank seeks to establish how South Asia’s regional pandemic prevention and response (PPR) can be strengthened in a sustainable manner. The regionalisation of PPR is key for an effective global response to the emergence of future pathogens with pandemic potential. South Asia is home to a quarter of the world’s population and has a considerable number of densely populated large cities where new pathogens can emerge and spread rapidly. Yet particularly South Asia’s poorer countries do not yet have the systems and capacities to prevent and manage such scenarios.

An m4h in-house team of economists, public health experts and researchers are implementing the following work packages:

• Identifying PPR gaps at national and regional level
• With a One Health approach, defining the services needed to fill these gaps
• Proposing a regional PPR financing mechanism through which these services can be sustainably financed.