Week One: From Outbreak to Pandemic: Year Two and Counting
Wednesday, July 14, 2021 Live at 6:00 pm This event is free and open to the public.
As we move into the second year of COVID-19, some communities are emerging from months of isolation, assessing damages, removing masks, and navigating toward a “new normal.” While it’s tempting to feel like a finish line has been crossed with some incredible progress having been made, the pandemic is far from over. It still rages across the globe, with infections, deaths, and more transmissible variants emerging faster than the availability and pace of vaccinations. The juxtaposition is striking given that almost four million people have died globally, and the death rate in 2021 already exceeds that of 2020.
The pandemic has wreaked havoc on the economy, politics, trust in institutions, and reshaped lives in ways not yet understood. In this series, we invite experts into our virtual classroom to assess how far we have come, how far we have to go until the world is vaccinated and to examine some of the most consequential and inequitable outcomes to date. Although many of us are quite literally sick of COVID, in this 2nd edition of our survey course for everyone, we’ll offer a unique take on the politics of the global public policy response, present a diversity of perspectives on what the post-pandemic new normal will be, and explore whether we will be any better prepared for the next global crisis.
SPEAKERS: Helen W. Boucher Jonathan Haughton Jan Vogler Renuka Rayasam
