What can be learned from comparative (cross-country)

Covid governance?

Thursday, March 2, 2023; 1:00 – 3:00 p.m. EST

In this time of geopolitical tensions, can Covid serve as example of how countries (and their peoples) may learn from one another about dealing with "local" impacts of common global challenges? NAPA’s Social Equity in Governance and International Affairs Standing Panels are pleased to sponsor a discussion, with topics including:

• With Covid as an example, how can public administration scholars and practitioners learn from experiences of other countries?

• With equity as a common global health challenge, what can US scholars and practitioners learn from Covid governance experiences of other countries?

• What might next steps be for comparative learning –about governance of local impacts of global health challenges?

The discussion will draw on Louise Comfort and Mary Lee Rhodes' edited country comparison: Global Risk Management; The Role of Collective Cognition in response to Covid-19 (2022) and Racial Equity, COVID-19, and Public Policy: The Triple Pandemic, edited by Elsie L. Harper-Anderson, Jay S. Albanese, and Susan T. Gooden (Feb 2023).

Following introduction of their books by Louise Comfort, Mary Lee Rhodes, and Elsie Harper-Anderson, discussion will be kicked off by University of Pennsylvania bioethics/health care scholar, Harald Schmidt, drawing on his Covid-era Federal and local government advising and research, and Wenjuan Zhang, a comparative governance scholar visiting at the Kennedy School.

Further Background for the discussion can be found at:

• Schmidt, H., Weintraub, R., Williams, M.A. et al. Equitable allocation of COVID-19 vaccines in the United States. Nat Med 27, 1298–1307 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-021-01379-6

• Schmidt H, Roberts DE, Eneanya ND Rationing, racism and justice: advancing the debate around ‘colourblind’ COVID-19 ventilator allocation Journal of Medical Ethics 2022;48:126-130. https://jme.bmj.com/content/48/2/126

• Schmidt H, Pathak P, Sönmez T, Ünver M U. Covid-19: how to prioritize worse-off populations in allocating safe and effective vaccines BMJ 2020; 371 :m3795 https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m3795.long

• Keerty Nakray, Zhang Yi, John Clammer, Wenjuan Zhang, Social and Economic Transitions in India and China: Welfare and Policy Changes by Palgrave Macmillan. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-19-6124-3