Elections & Energy Policy Brief

ELECTIONS & ENERGY | La Jolla Conference 30 th Anniversary Policy Brief

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THE PANDEMIC’S HIGH COST AND LIMITED POLICY OPTIONS

The downturn in commodity prices meant that when Covid-19 hit, Latin America was already facing major financial and economic challenges, along with political polarization, and increasing social tensions. Paradoxically, the pandemic offered a short-lived respite from social protests while the population focused on the most primordial priority: survival. In the early days of the pandemic, some leaders, such as Alberto Fernandez of Argentina and Ivan Duque of Colombia, increased their popularity with swift and drastic lockdown measures. Ivan Duque’s nightly TV updates became a hit among Colombians. However, if there was a region that was unprepared to face the challenge of a global pandemic, it was Latin America.

With a large urban population highly dependent on day-to-day informal jobs and without access to health care, lockdowns were extremely difficult to implement. The health care infrastructure was inadequate after years of underfunding . G overnment fiscal space was severely restrained. As the pandemic dragged on, and government transfers proved to be insufficient while the death toll continued to grow, protests quickly resumed in Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, and at the time of writing, Colombia is experiencing its worst social uprising in recent history.

ANNIVERSARY POLICY BRIEF | INSITUTE OF THE AMERICAS

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