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An outcomes/impact evaluation was undertaken (July 2023–April 2024) to evaluate the work of the World Health Organization (WHO) infection prevention and control (IPC) coronavirus disease (COVID‐19) response team during the COVID‐19 pandemic and to identify how to better prepare for the next pandemic. The evaluation used mixed methods, focusing on three pillars of the team's work: (1) interim guidance and guidelines; (2) OpenWHO IPC courses; and (3) risk communication and community engagement (RCCE) interventions. A literature review, interviews with WHO headquarters and regional staff, case studies, and multicountry surveys were undertaken. Of the national representatives surveyed, 97% reported that the guidelines impacted their work; overall 76% of Member States used RCCE interventions and products; and 99% of course participants used what they learned professionally or personally. Member States identified gaps relating to national contextualization, availability of feedback and monitoring mechanisms, and knowledge sharing. There is strong evidence of the impact, effectiveness, and use of this team's work in developing IPC COVID‐19 guidelines and through courses developed and shared via OpenWHO; however, there is weaker evidence on the impact of RCCE products/interventions as a standalone activity. To be better prepared for the next pandemic, Member States and the WHO need to collectively identify how best to sustain the IPC gains and address the gaps. GRAPHICAL An evaluation exploring the impact of the WHO IPC COVID‐19 response team's work. The mixed methods evaluation reviewed: WHO guidelines, OpenWHO courses, and RCCE products. Member States identified gaps in contextualization, availability of feedback mechanisms, and knowledge sharing. To prepare for a future pandemic, gains must be sustained and gaps addressed.

Like many libraries across Canada, Manitoba public libraries have grappled with the challenges that COVID-19 has presented. Libraries have struggled to remain operational and offer a high level of service to patrons within the constraint of public health orders, all the while ensuring the safety and employment of their staff. Within the ever-changing environment of COVID-19, the Manitoba Library Association recognized the need to gather information from the library community in order to better position themselves to lend support and in an attempt to bridge information gaps. This article describes a study conducted by the Manitoba Library Association whereby fifty-five Manitoba public libraries were surveyed to identify how they were responding to COVID-19 and what their needs might be. The survey questions were divided into 6 sections (facilities, services, communications, staffing, connecting, wrap-up) and the results provide information and insight into how the Manitoba library community has dealt with the pandemic. More importantly, the results can serve to guide other libraries in decision-making and preparation for a pandemic.

ObjectivesCommunication is central to the implementation and effectiveness of public health measures. Informed by theories of good governance, COVID-19 pandemic public health messaging in 3 Canadian provinces is assessed for its potential to encourage or undermine public trust and adherence.MethodsThis study employed a mixed-methods constant comparative approach to triangulate epidemiological COVID-19 data and qualitative data from news releases, press briefings, and key informant interviews. Communications were analyzed from January 2020 to October 2021 in Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Alberta. Interview data came from 34 semi-structured key informant interviews with public health actors across Canada. Team-based coding and thematic analysis were conducted to analyze communications and interview transcripts.ResultsFour main themes emerged as integral to good communication: transparency, promptness, clarity, and engagement of diverse communities. Our data indicate that a lack of transparency surrounding evidence and public health decision-making, delays in public health communications, unclear and inconsistent terminology and activities within and across jurisdictions, and communications that did not consider or engage diverse communities’ perspectives may have decreased the effectiveness of public health communications and adherence to public health measures throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.ConclusionThis study suggests that increased federal guidance with wider jurisdictional collaboration backed by transparent evidence could improve the effectiveness of communication practices by instilling public trust and adherence with public health measures. Effective communication should be transparent, supported by reliable evidence, prompt, clear, consistent, and sensitive to diverse values. Improved communication training, established engagement infrastructure, and increased collaborations and diversity of decision-makers and communicators are recommended.

In the current context of the global pandemic of coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), health professionals are working with social scientists to inform government policy on how to slow the spread of the virus. An increasing amount of social scientific research has looked at the role of public message framing, for instance, but few studies have thus far examined the role of individual differences in emotional and personality-based variables in predicting virus-mitigating behaviors. In this study, we recruited a large international community sample ( N  = 324) to complete measures of self-perceived risk of contracting COVID-19, fear of the virus, moral foundations, political orientation, and behavior change in response to the pandemic. Consistently, the only predictor of positive behavior change (e.g., social distancing, improved hand hygiene) was fear of COVID-19, with no effect of politically relevant variables. We discuss these data in relation to the potentially functional nature of fear in global health crises.

Exploring the results of the COVID-19 response in New Zealand (Aotearoa) is warranted so that insights can inform future pandemic planning. We compared the COVID-19 response in New Zealand to that for the more severe 1918–19 influenza pandemic. Both pandemics were caused by respiratory viruses, but the 1918–19 pandemic was short, intense, and yielded a higher mortality rate. The government and societal responses to COVID-19 were vastly superior; responses had a clear strategic direction and included a highly effective elimination strategy, border restrictions, minimal community spread for 20 months, successful vaccination rollout, and strong central government support. Both pandemics involved a whole-of-government response, community mobilization, and use of public health and social measures. Nevertheless, lessons from 1918–19 on the necessity of action to prevent inequities among different social groups were not fully learned, as demonstrated by the COVID-19 response and its ongoing unequal health outcomes in New Zealand.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is caused by the novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which appeared in late 2019, generating a pandemic crisis with high numbers of COVID-19-related infected individuals and deaths in manifold countries worldwide. Lessons learned from COVID-19 can be used to prevent pandemic threats by designing strategies to support different policy responses, not limited to the health system, directed to reduce the risks of the emergence of novel viral agents, the diffusion of infectious diseases and negative impact in society.

The SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes the COVID-19 disease is highly infectious and contagious. The long-term consequences for individuals are as yet unknown, while the long-term effects on the international community will be dramatic. COVID-19 has changed the world forever in every imaginable respect and has impacted heavily on the international travel, tourism demand, and hospitality industry, which is one of the world’s largest employers and is highly sensitive to significant shocks like the COVID-19 pandemic. It is essential to investigate how the industry will recover after COVID-19 and how the industry can be made sustainable in a dramatically changed world. This paper presents a charter for tourism, travel, and hospitality after COVID-19 as a contribution to the industry.

Intervention measures have been implemented around the world to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. Understanding the dynamics of the disease spread and the effectiveness of the interventions is essential in predicting its future evolution. The aim of this study is to simulate the effect of different social distancing interventions and investigate whether their timing and stringency can lead to multiple waves (subepidemics), which can provide a better fit to the wavy behavior observed in the infected population curve in the majority of countries. We have designed and run agent-based simulations and a multiple wave model to fit the infected population data for many countries. We have also developed a novel Pandemic Response Index to provide a quantitative and objective way of ranking countries according to their COVID-19 response performance. We have analyzed data from 18 countries based on the multiple wave (subepidemics) hypothesis and present the relevant parameters. Multiple waves have been identified and were found to describe the data better. The effectiveness of intervention measures can be inferred by the peak intensities of the waves. Countries imposing fast and stringent interventions exhibit multiple waves with declining peak intensities. This result strongly corroborated with agent-based simulations outcomes. We also provided an estimate of how much lower the number of infections could have been if early and strict intervention measures had been taken to stop the spread at the first wave, as actually happened for a handful of countries. A novel index, the Pandemic Response Index, was constructed, and based on the model's results, an index value was assigned to each country, quantifying in an objective manner the country's response to the pandemic. Our results support the hypothesis that the COVID-19 pandemic can be successfully modeled as a series of epidemic waves (subepidemics) and that it is possible to infer to what extent the imposition of early intervention measures can slow the spread of the disease.

While the health impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on frontline health care workers have been well described, the effects of the COVID-19 response on the U.S. public health workforce, which has been impacted by the prolonged public health response to the pandemic, has not been adequately characterized. A cross-sectional survey of public health professionals was conducted to assess mental and physical health, risk and protective factors for burnout, and short- and long-term career decisions during the pandemic response. The survey was completed online using the Qualtrics survey platform. Descriptive statistics and prevalence ratios (95% confidence intervals) were calculated. Among responses received from 23 August and 11 September 2020, 66.2% of public health workers reported burnout. Those with more work experience (1–4 vs. <1 years: prevalence ratio (PR) = 1.90, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.08−3.36; 5–9 vs. <1 years: PR = 1.89, CI = 1.07−3.34) or working in academic settings (vs. practice: PR = 1.31, CI = 1.08–1.58) were most likely to report burnout. As of September 2020, 23.6% fewer respondents planned to remain in the U.S. public health workforce for three or more years compared to their retrospectively reported January 2020 plans. A large-scale public health emergency response places unsustainable burdens on an already underfunded and understaffed public health workforce. Pandemic-related burnout threatens the U.S. public health workforce’s future when many challenges related to the ongoing COVID-19 response remain unaddressed.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has had widespread social, psychological, and economic impacts. However, these impacts are not distributed equally: already marginalized populations, specifically racial/ethnic minority groups and sexual and gender minority populations, may be more likely to suffer the effects of COVID-19. The COVID-19 Resiliency Survey was conducted by the city of Chicago to assess the impact of COVID-19 on city residents in the wake of Chicago’s initial lockdown, with particular focus on the experiences of minority populations. Chi-square tests of independence were performed to compare COVID-19-related outcomes and impacts on heterosexual vs. sexual minority populations, cisgender vs. gender minority populations, and White vs. racial/ethnic minority subgroups. Marginalized populations experienced significant disparities in COVID-19 exposure, susceptibility, and treatment access, as well as in psychosocial effects of the pandemic. Notably, Black and Latinx populations reported significant difficulties accessing food and supplies (p = 0.002). Healthcare access disparities were also visible, with Black and Latinx respondents reporting significantly lower levels of access to a provider to see if COVID-19 testing would be appropriate (p = 0.013), medical services (p = 0.001), and use of telehealth for mental health services (p = 0.001). Sexual minority respondents reported significantly lower rates of using telehealth for mental health services (p = 0.011), and gender minority respondents reported significantly lower levels of primary care provider access (p = 0.016). There are evident COVID-19 disparities experienced in Chicago especially for Black, Latinx, sexual minority, and gender minority groups. A greater focus must be paid to health equity, including providing increased resources and supplies for affected groups, adapting to inequities in the built environment, and ensuring adequate access to healthcare services to ameliorate the burden of COVID-19 on these marginalized populations.