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. 2023 Nov 29:11:1274737.
doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2023.1274737. eCollection 2023.

Assessing pandemic preparedness, response, and lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic in four south American countries: agenda for the future

Andrea Ramírez Varela  1 , Michael Touchton  2 , J Jaime Miranda  3 , Juliana Mejía Grueso  1 , Rachid Laajaj  4 , Gabriel Carrasquilla  5 , Martha Vives Florez  6 , Ana María Vesga Gaviria  7 , Ana María Ortiz Hoyos  8 , Esteban Orlando Vanegas Duarte  1 , Alejandra Velásquez Morales  9 , Nubia Velasco  10 , Silvia Restrepo Restrepo  11
Affiliations

Assessing pandemic preparedness, response, and lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic in four south American countries: agenda for the future

Andrea Ramírez Varela et al. Front Public Health. .

Abstract

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic emerged in a context that lacked adequate prevention, preparedness, and response (PPR) activities, and global, regional, and national leadership. South American countries were among world's hardest hit by the pandemic, accounting for 10.1% of total cases and 20.1% of global deaths.

Methods: This study explores how pandemic PPR were affected by political, socioeconomic, and health system contexts as well as how PPR may have shaped pandemic outcomes in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Peru. We then identify lessons learned and advance an agenda for improving PPR capacity at regional and national levels. We do this through a mixed-methods sequential explanatory study in four South American countries based on structured interviews and focus groups with elite policy makers.

Results: The results of our study demonstrate that structural and contextual barriers limited PPR activities at political, social, and economic levels in each country, as well as through the structure of the health care system. Respondents believe that top-level government officials had insufficient political will for prioritizing pandemic PPR and post-COVID-19 recovery programs within their countries' health agendas.

Discussion: We recommend a regional COVID-19 task force, post-pandemic recovery, social and economic protection for vulnerable groups, improved primary health care and surveillance systems, risk communication strategies, and community engagement to place pandemic PPR on Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Peru and other South American countries' national public health agendas.

Keywords: COVID-19; COVID-19 pandemic; South America; lessons learned; preparedness and response.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Multidimensional and Multilevel Conceptual Framework for the COVID-19 Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness, and Response (PPR). Based on frameworks from Huynen et al. (6), Bollyky et al. (8), and the University of Miami’s Observatory for the Containment of COVID-19 (7).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Factors that (A) Facilitated, (B) Hindered, and (C) led to Lessons Learned for Pandemic PPR: 2020–2021.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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