Recovery, the Unfinished Business of the Pandemic

The Wire

19 hours ago

The consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic far outlasted the health emergency. Long after infection curves flattened and emergency declarations were lifted, countries across the globe continued to wrestle with a deep economic, social and health-related fallout.
In India, over 23 crore people were pushed into poverty during the pandemic years, with rural and informal sector workers bearing the brunt, and the economic spillover continues to be seen in the form of increased government debt, rising inflation, a stagnating hospitality industry and other things, even after half a decade has passed since the onset of COVID.
In the health sector, the disruption to routine immunisation services led to measles outbreaks in numerous Sub-Saharan countries, while a UNICEF report warned that about 23 million children missed out on essential vaccines in 2020 alone.
Mental health outcomes also deteriorated sharply. Data from the WHO shows that there was a 25% global increase in anxiety and depression in the first year of the pandemic.
These aftershocks demonstrate that recovery is not a passive return to normalcy – it is a protracted and complex phase that demands sustained attention, governance and resource mobilisation.
The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered worldwide efforts to mitigate the scale and impact of future health emergencies, including amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR); the creation of the Pandemic Fund and the WHO Pandemic Intelligence Hub; and the ACT-Accelerator, COVAX and One Health initiatives.
The latest – and most talked-about – in this series of efforts is the WHO Pandemic Agreement, which was adopted on May 20, 2025 after three years of negotiations and discussions. It will become a legally binding international instrument on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response once it is signed by 60 countries.
After India's vote in favour of the resolution to adopt the agreement, making it an official state party to the agreement, the prime minister has talked about its importance for vulnerable populations in the Global South that disproportionately bear the effects of health challenges.
In order to successfully achieve this goal, the agreement needs to accomplish two things – chart out obligations targeted towards vulnerable populations, and highlight the specific ways in which pandemics' disproportionate impact on the Global South can be mitigated.
While the agreement does lay the ground for equity in both aspects, it falls short of outlining implementable measures to achieve these goals meaningfully without hindering sovereign decisions. Notably, the Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing (PABS) annex, a critical component tied to equity and access, still has another year to be worked out, further delaying clarity on how benefit-sharing commitments will be operationalised.
Commendably, the agreement talks about the need to provide affordable health and other social support services to 'persons in vulnerable situations'. It also calls for the mitigation of the socioeconomic impacts of pandemics on such persons. However, it misses an opportunity to guide state parties on when and how this should be done at the domestic and trans-national levels, especially at the time of recovery.
Integrating recovery into the pandemic agreement
Article 3 of the agreement, titled 'Preparedness, health system resilience and recovery', gestures toward the importance of post-pandemic strategies. However, recovery is buried within broader health system resilience goals and mentioned only in passing. It refers vaguely to 'developing post-pandemic health system recovery strategies' without outlining how, when or by whom such strategies must be developed, implemented or monitored. This diluted treatment effectively renders recovery a discretionary task, rather than an obligation.
There is no requirement for countries to assess the long-term impacts of pandemics on vulnerable populations, nor is there any architecture for coordinating recovery efforts, allocating responsibilities or ensuring accountability.
In the light of this gap, recovery must be established as a clear, foundational pillar within the pandemic agreement – not a vague aspiration buried under resilience.
It is important to acknowledge at the onset that international treaties cannot impose rigid mandates on sovereign states. However, by creating shared expectations and enabling frameworks, they can support states in fulfilling recovery goals without infringing on national autonomy.
Rather than prescribe uniform recovery models, the agreement can promote adaptable, equity-based cooperation that complements domestic efforts while ensuring accountability and consistency across borders.
The agreement should require states to develop standalone national recovery frameworks tailored to their contexts, with explicit mandates for implementation, periodic review and transparent reporting. Recovery should be understood broadly – not just as restoring health systems but as encompassing social, economic and mental health dimensions affected by pandemics.
A comprehensive recovery approach must prioritise impact assessments focused on marginalised and vulnerable populations – including gender minorities, workers in the informal sector, migrants, senior citizens, homeless populations, persons with disabilities and ethnic minorities – who disproportionately suffer during crises.
These assessments should directly inform targeted economic and social policies, such as livelihood restoration, social protection adjustments and reintegration support, to prevent widening inequalities in the post-crisis phase.
Further, recovery goals must be multi-dimensional and should account for the wide-ranging impact of pandemics across different key areas. Accordingly, the agreement should embed principles for access to justice and redressal mechanisms for harms suffered during pandemics, the restoration of disrupted education systems, safeguards for the continuity of essential public and welfare services, mechanisms for the review of governmental decisions and actions during the state of exception, and the rebuilding of public trust through transparent and participatory governance.
The absence of these dimensions risks a recovery that is piecemeal and opaque, weakening institutional integrity and leaving societies more vulnerable to future crises.
International cooperation in recovery efforts
In order to achieve the aim of equity, especially across the Global North-Global South divide, the international community must direct its attention to recovery efforts across national borders. The agreement must institutionalise mechanisms for international coordination and solidarity during the recovery phase, facilitating sharing of expertise, resources and data across countries to reduce regional vulnerabilities and promote equitable resilience.
The bodies set up under the agreement do not account for this adequately, in terms of function or finances.
The mechanisms set up under the agreement, such as PABS, deal with important functions like pathogen and data sharing, and pharmaceutical supply and distribution. There are no such systems established for recovery.
The Coordinating Financial Mechanism previously established under the IHR has been envisaged as the mechanism to promote sustainable financing for the implementation of the pandemic agreement as well. Its mandate under the pandemic agreement is to 'support strengthening and expanding capacities for pandemic prevention, preparedness and response, and contribute to the prompt availability of surge financing response necessary as of day zero, particularly in developing country Parties.'
This conspicuously and concerningly misses recovery as a crucial stage of assessing impacts and developing strategies for rebuilding, which is especially crucial for low and middle-income countries in the Global South, including India.
The cultural impact of international documents
Understandably, international agreements cannot impose specific obligations in the same way that domestic laws can. Given the legally binding nature of the pandemic agreement, it should also refrain from interfering with sovereign and context-specific decisions adopted at the national and sub-national levels.
At the same time, beyond policy prescriptions, international treaties play a critical role in shaping legal cultures and empowering civil society to demand justice and reform. By embedding preparedness, resilience-building and recovery within the pandemic agreement, the global community will be able to create a shared vocabulary and normative framework that activists, policymakers and courts can invoke domestically to advance equity and resilience.
India's past experience has illustrated this dynamic vividly. The Vishakha Guidelines on workplace sexual harassment, which transformed protections for women, were grounded in India's commitments under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. Similarly, the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has influenced landmark judicial decisions and legislative reforms enhancing disability rights and access to welfare in India.
What can be done to prioritise recovery?
While laying out the rules or procedure and terms of reference, the Intergovernmental Working Group empowered under the agreement must lay down specific provisions on recovery, including indicative domestic guidance, mechanisms for international cooperation and sustainable financing or recovery that recognises marginalisation and prioritises equity.
Embedding principles that prioritise domestic and international efforts will shift recovery from a discretionary afterthought to a binding commitment that demands accountability without prescribing inflexible solutions. It provides states with a flexible but clear mandate to build inclusive, adaptive recovery architectures that address the deep, lasting fallout of pandemics.
Shreyashi Ray is a senior resident fellow with the health team at the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy. Anchal Bhatheja is a research fellow at the centre.