New Insights Report: How can self-care help health systems rebuild better during COVID-19?
COVID-19 has placed enormous pressures on already fragile health systems. Developed with life sciences company Bayer, our new Insights Report explores how wider uptake of ‘self-care’ approaches can reduce pressure on strained health systems, improve vulnerable people’s health outcomes and empower individuals and communities in the process.
There are many ways to enhance self-care: from self-testing HIV kits in Kenya, to food fortification and micronutrient supplements, to telemedicine campaigns being led by US pharmacies and far more besides.
The report calls for digital first approaches, elevating the role of pharmacists, improving whole of government strategies and building a multi-stakeholder movement of actors to advance self-care.
You can hear more in our Spotlight Podcast with Daniella Foster VP & Global Head of Public Affairs, Bayer. In this interview, Daniella explains how self-care does not replace vital services, but should be seen as an essential part of the healthcare continuum. She also shares insights from the research, including how “self-care can potentially break the cycle of poverty.”
Catch up on the Rebuild Better Virtual Summit: Where Now?
As well as supporting self-care approaches, business can play a key role in supporting public uptake of COVID-19 vaccines. We explored both these issues during the Rebuild Better Virtual Summit: Where Now?
It was evident from the rich discussion that the private sector can do a huge amount to help find a way out of the current crisis and to tackle pressing social challenges, particularly when we engage with a transformative mindset.
As Desta Lakew, Global Director of Partnerships, Amref Health Africa, commented during our first webinar:
“Businesses want to deliver change. Businesses want to participate in what we’re doing. Businesses recognise that countries are hurting. Communities are hurting. And they’re actually joining us and leveraging all of their resources to support what we’re doing. What I have seen is that business has heart.”
You can watch highlights and access free resources from the day, including the full fireside chat with Jane Nelson, Director, Corporate Responsibility Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School, via the event page.
You can also access full recordings and written summaries of both our webinars, Understanding the Health Pathways out of the Pandemic and Understanding the critical role of mindsets in driving a just and regenerative future with a digital pass.
Gain new insights from our written content
Our written content has also highlighted some of the key issues and actions for businesses who want to support the vaccine roll-out:
- Find out the Five mantras for effective COVID-19 vaccine communication to increase healthy behaviours and vaccine uptake, with Yvonne MacPherson, US Director and Radharani Mitra, Global Creative Advisor, BBC Media Action
- In Fast + Fair: Vaccine Plans Must be Inclusive and Leave No One Behind, Laura Hawkesford, Head of Private Sector Engagement, CARE International UK explains how partnering and a gender focus are key to providing vulnerable populations such as women, girls, and refugees with safe access to medical services, COVID-19 vaccination and important health information.
- Another vulnerable group, People living with Disabilities, are struggling to access information and protective measures during the pandemic. Find out what is being done to solve this problem in Kenya, in Enabling greater inclusion of PWD’s amid the pandemic with Maggie Rarieya, Head Of Secretariat, National Business Compact On Coronavirus.
We have also published reflections from our community on how the pandemic is shaping our future.
- 2020 Hindsight to 2021 Foresight: Driving the Inclusive Digitization of MSMEs shares the four guiding principles that the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth uses to get MSMEs thriving in an inclusive and sustainable digital economy, co-authored by Payal Dalal, Senior Vice President, Social Impact, International Markets and Luz Gomez, Director, Latin America and the Caribbean, Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth.
- In Primary health workforce learning in an era of COVID-19: is digital delivery here to stay? Jack Barton, Zahra Shah and Dr Niti Pall, Primary Care International (PCI) explain how innovative approaches to digital training have opened up new learning opportunities for healthcare workers, particularly in resource-poor settings.
- The 2021 Edelman Trust Barometer reports a crisis of public trust in institutions, and that business is now the most trusted institution, and the only institution considered both competent and ethical. In Reflections on the 2021 Edelman Trust Barometer, Annabel Beales, Writer, Business Fights Poverty, highlights five ways that business can respond.
As we take on the huge social and environmental challenges ahead, data will play an ever-greater role:
- Measuring sustainability is complex, but getting it right matters. In Unlocking the power of data for sustainability systems, Robert Lefebure, Innovations Senior Manager, ISEAL, explores how sustainability systems can “make the most of their data assets to support the environmental and social transformations our world needs.”
- “From domestic violence to unpaid care work, in an era where our lives are increasingly dominated by an ocean of data, we simply don’t have the numbers to help us explain women’s lives.” In Women in industry – why we need more gender-sensitive statistics Jenny Larsen, UNDIO, calls for gender-disagreggation of data to help improve women’s employment opportunities,
Lastly, you can catch up on some of the work that Business Fights’ Poverty has collaborated on over the last six months, in Issue 6 of our Magazine, out now. It includes articles on how business is building back better with jobs, a guide to effective planning, collaborations between the agricultural and mining sectors, and more.
