How can we protect the world’s poor from coronavirus and its economic effects?

Jun 11, 2020

A man sleeps on a mattress at the terrace of a bar at night, amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Barcelona, Spain, June 1, 2020. REUTERS/Nacho Doce - RC2L0H9VNC5U

Image: REUTERS/Nacho Doce - RC2L0H9VNC5U

Erik Berglof

Director, Institute of Global Affairs, School of Public Policy, London School of Economics & Political Sciences

Gordon Brown

United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education; Chair, International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity, The Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown

Helen E. Clark

Chair, Lancet Countdown High-Level Advisory Board on Health and Climate Change

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala

Director-General, World Trade Organization (WTO)

Our Impact

The Big Picture

Explore and monitor how COVID-19 is affecting economies, industries and global issues

A hand holding a looking glass by a lake

Crowdsource Innovation

Get involved with our crowdsourced digital platform to deliver impact at scale

Stay up to date:

COVID-19

COVID-19 could push half a billion people into poverty. Image: Statista

Same Diop, a taxi driver who says is unable to shuttle passengers between Touba and Dakar and struggling to support his family due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) restrictions, holds out his identity card as he begs on the street in the holy city of Touba, Senegal June 3, 2020. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra - RC2W1H94R065

Image: REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra - RC2W1H94R065

Don't miss any update on this topic

Create a free account and access your personalized content collection with our latest publications and analyses.

License and Republishing

World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, and in accordance with our Terms of Use.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.