The pandemic has created a challenging environment for global health, placing significant strain on all health systems and resources. 

While COVID-19 has placed a much-needed spotlight on global health, it has put pre-existing health systems and resources under immense pressure. It has also rerouted focus and funding away from other dire global health issues, particularly those that have a disproportionate impact on impoverished communities. Tuberculosis, polio, and malnutrition are three key examples, responsible for millions of preventable deaths each year.

Tuberculosis and malnutrition have both been referred to as “silent pandemics”. They are epidemics of poverty, spreading illness and death only among countries that cannot afford to treat them. Similarly, polio remains stubbornly endemic in a handful of countries.