Global community needs to collaborate to tackle future risks

Global community needs to collaborate to tackle future risks

If the past two years of battling COVID-19 have taught us anything, it is to always have a plan that protects us from calamitous risks. Despite several health outbreaks in recent years and experts sounding the alarm about a looming pandemic, little was done to bolster global health security measures. The International Monetary Fund in January amended its economic forecasts to state that the COVID-19 pandemic could cost the global economy a whopping $12.5 trillion by 2024.

Going forward, it is critical for nations to come together and address the shared global challenges that have the potential to unravel our social and economic progress. By taking a proactive approach, governments can ensure they have solid plans in place to respond to various risks, minimizing avoidable precious human, resource and financial losses. This approach will also ensure that risks are identified early on, instigating a global effort toward addressing them using evidence-based and strategic methods. Moreover, a robust framework for decision-making and planning would ensure measures are integrated within various systems to make them more resilient to shocks.

At the same time, such assessments would reveal any existing vulnerabilities within diverse systems that need to be bolstered, such as a lack of assistive