Description :

The webinar assessed the implications of COVID-19 on life in cities, including discussions on health, access to public services, impacts on the vulnerable, government responses and recovery strategies. Our panel consisted of three urban development experts, Amit Prothi, Director, Global Resilient Cities Network (Singapore); Chris Blache, Founder, Genre et Ville (France); and Dr. Umamaheshwaran Rajasekar — Chair Urban Resilience (India). They discussed successful government interventions and responses to COVID-19 in Singapore, France, and India respectively. The webinar also included how countries can ensure that their responses promote health equity and reduce inequality, and look at different scenarios for ending quarantine and returning to the new normal. During the webinar Chris pointed out that our next crisis might not be about lungs or health, so we need to relook at the fundamentals of governance. We need to work with people and not for the people, we need to go back to social leg of governance. Amit added to this sentiment saying we must take a systems approach and identify the weaknesses of the system to respond to such crisis. This new approach includes tapping into people’s imagination because people have seen a different reality now.