The ‘Real’ Wolf of Wall Street- COVID-19’s Impact on Global Economies & Healthcare Systems

Globally, over 3.3 million people have contracted COVID-19 and > 230,000 have died. The outbreak has strangled the world economy and has tested the resilience of all health systems —robust or fragile. While all categories of the economy have been affected, pandemic has directly affected people and possession processing services the most. For all countries analyzed, an average economic impact of -4.5% of GDP is expected. We assessed the response to the COVID-19 pandemic by healthcare systems in terms of testing capability, surge capacity, and collaboration; focusing on United States, United Kingdom, Singapore, China, and Pakistan. Despite its success, the China model cannot be the go-to paradigm everywhere as level of compliance to local authorities, harsh lockdown measures, and ability to quickly complete labor-intensive projects may not be replicable in other countries. Therefore, a context-specific strategy is necessary to deal with pandemic. COVID-19 pandemic has exposed multiple fault lines in health systems in term of accessibility, adaptability, and preparedness. It has also become clear that a global economy centered on the principle of capital accumulation and not societal uplift is not sustainable through times of crises.