Education and Pandemic Responses & Public Health
Education is essential during the response to a pandemic and the key to long-term recovery.
Strong and resilient education systems are one of the most helpful ways to prepare young people for shocks, disseminate accurate information about health and hygiene, deliver essential health services, and restore a sense of normality during crises. School networks can ensure young people, especially the most marginalised and vulnerable, are looked after and supported during ongoing challenges in their communities. Investing in quality and inclusive education during a pandemic and in post-pandemic recovery helps a cohort of children to remain resilient, rebound after a crisis and be better prepared for the future.
Key challenges
Children in developing countries had low levels of participation in education post-pandemic. In 35 developing countries, among households with children who attended school before school closure, around 53% of households reported children participating in any educational activities after the school closure due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
(World Bank, 2022)For girls, being out of school increases the risk of child marriage, teen pregnancy, gender-based violence, sexual exploitation, and child labour. During the Ebola outbreak, teen pregnancies in certain parts of Sierra Leone increased by 65%, and child labour by girls increased 19%. (UNDP, 2015) (UNICEF, 2021)
Distance education requires innovative solutions to overcome the digital divide. Only 47% of households in developing countries and 12% in the least developed countries have access to the Internet at home. Even in countries with wide Internet access, such as Italy, one in four households lack a strong enough connection to download and stream education content. (GEM, 2020)
Pandemics can have severe immediate and long-lasting consequences for entire generations. COVID-19 disrupted the education of more than 1.6 billion, with an expected additional 10 million children — often girls and the most marginalised — expected to never return to school again. (Save the Children, 2020)
Distance learning initiatives utilized during pandemics need to be strengthened. Nearly 80% of parents believed that their children had learned little or nothing while schools were shuttered during the COVID-19 crisis. (Save the Children, 2020)
Even short-term school closures during pandemics significantly increase learning loss. In low- and middle-income countries, learning losses to school closures have left up to 70% of 10-year-olds unable to read or understand a simple text, up from 53% pre-COVID-19. (UNICEF, 2022)
Significant commitment and investment to education needs to be marshaled to return progress made to pre-pandemic levels. Modeling suggests that grade three reading proficiency will only return to pre-pandemic levels in 2030 at current rates. (Gustafsson, 2021)
Schools are a reliable source of food and daily nutrition for many children. Over 370 million children globally missed out on school meals during school closures caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. (UNICEF, 2022)
Reducing investment in education leads to greater health cost burdens on government budgets. In the US, reduced spending in education led to more illness and higher medical care costs that offset the intended ‘savings’ of the same budget cuts. (AAFP, 2015)
School closures could have significant health consequences. The closure of schools for long periods of time could have great social and health consequences for children and could exacerbate existing inequalities, widen the gap in educational attainment between pupils and possibly undo previous progress. During COVID, approximately 365 million primary school students went without school meals and reported increased rates of stress, anxiety and other mental health issues. (The Lancet, 2020) (WHO, 2021)
Make the case
Education is a priority for children. In a survey of thousands of children across 17 emergency scenarios, 99% said education was a top priority. (Save the Children, 2015)
It is critical to protect the childcare workers on the frontline during a pandemic. In the US, childcare workers are twice as likely to live in poverty, and only 15% have health insurance from their job compared with 49.9% of other workers. (Gould, 2015).
Mental health services from schools during crises prevent irreversible damage from ‘toxic stress’. Every US dollar invested in social emotional learning interventions in schools can yield a return of US$11. (Education Cannot Wait, 2019)
School is a critical place to disseminate important information about hygiene and public health. In a meta-review of 38 studies, all the studies that examined changes in knowledge, attitudes, and hygiene behaviours reported positive change among children, such as hand-washing with soap. (McMichael, 2019)
A little bit of education goes a long way during a pandemic. When schools closed in Sierra Leone due to Ebola, a one-hour daily class for girls in life skills, sexual and reproductive health, and vocational learning was enough to reduce by half the rate of drop outs from school post-crisis. (Bandiera et al., 2018)
Restoring education as quickly as possible helps children rebound. Investment into education post-pandemic is especially important, given that children may lose more than a full year’s worth of learning from a three-month closure if no special remediation measures are taken. (Kaffenberger, 2020)
Investing in education helps build a strong public health workforce to combat future pandemics. Greater investments are needed to strengthen health workforce capacity and flexibility. This can also help to avoid the risk of entering another public health crisis or other global disruption that has these structural weaknesses. (OECD, 2023)
An educated mother provides a wealth of life-saving health benefits to her child. A child whose mother can read is 50% more likely to live past the age of five, 50% more likely to be immunised, and twice as likely to attend school. In Bangladesh, an extra year of maternal schooling reduces under five mortality by 21.54% and infant mortality by 22.54%.
(International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity, 2017) (Wu, 2022)Without investments in education, there will be a severe shortage of health workers. Without increased investment in education, by 2030 there will be a shortage of 15 million health workers worldwide – double what it is today. (Liu et al., 2017)
Educating girls saves lives Half of the reduction in under-five child mortality over nearly 40 years can be attributed to an increase in girls’ education. Educating girls has prevented the deaths of more than 30 million children under five and 100 million adults. (Gakidou et al., 2010) (International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity, 2016)
Educated women have a better understanding of healthy behaviour for themselves and for their children. In Peru, a country with one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the Western hemisphere, it has been shown that increasing women’s education decreases the probability of short birth intervals and unwanted pregnancies. (Weitzman, 2017)
A marginal increase in education yields tremendous decreases in pneumonia cases, the leading cause of child death worldwide. One additional year of maternal education reduces the pneumonia death rate by 14%, saving 160,000 child lives every year. (EFA GMR, 2014)
Investing in education delivers impressive and lasting health returns to society. Each US dollar invested in a one-year increase in schooling generates a health-inclusive benefit of US$10 in low-income countries. (Jamison & Schaferhoff, 2016)
The child of an educated parent is more likely to access malaria prevention and treatment services and survive childhood. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo — where 20% of the world’s malaria-related deaths occur — the probability of using a bed net increased by 75% if the head of household had completed primary education. 50% of preventable school absenteeism in Africa can be attributed to malaria. (Ndjinga & Minakawa, 2010) (Malaria No More, 2020)
Education is a cost-effective tool for preventing HIV transmission, providing the knowledge to reduce the risk of infection. If all young adults completed primary education, there would be seven million fewer new cases of HIV per decade. Girls out-of-school are three times more likely to be infected with HIV than those in school. Staying in secondary school can reduce HIV infection rates by as much as 60%. (Malala Fund, 2015) (Grepin & Bharadwaj, 2015) (De Neve et al., 2015)
Girls’ education saves lives. Around one-third of the reductions in adult mortality and nearly 15% of the reductions in infant mortality from 1970 to 2010 can be attributed to gains in female schooling. (Jamison & Schaferhoff, 2016)
Good health promotes learning. In developing countries an estimated 500 million days of school per year are lost due to sickness. (World Bank, 2018)
A focus on children’s health increases enrolment rates. Nutritious school meals increase school enrolment rates by 9% on average, and attendance by 8%. These meals can also reduce anemia in adolescent girls by up to 20%. Improving water and sanitation services in schools as well as information on menstrual hygiene equips girls to maintain their body hygiene and health with dignity and can limit the number of school days missed during menstruation. (WHO, 2021)
Key opinion
"While the disruptions to learning must end, just reopening schools is not enough. Students need intensive support to recover lost education. Schools must also go beyond places of learning to rebuild children’s mental and physical health, social development and nutrition."
"Education is the single best investment a country can make to raise to the most pressing challenges of our time. In an interconnected world, an educated population – especially girls – is an insurance policy for every aspect of a country’s future development, with wide-ranging benefits extending to health, economic growth, peace and stability. However, economic pressures brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic are squeezing education budgets around the world, just as investments are needed more than ever before. Sustaining domestic and global education budgets around the world is the key to a shared future fit for our children"
"The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the world's interconnectedness like nothing before it. At this moment in history, the opportunity increases to reinvent institutions and paradigms of education. It requires the world to come together in ways that have never been seen or done before - across borders, sectors and disciplines. Big changes start with small steps, so let’s use this moment as an opportunity to build back better education."
Key talking points
More than 616 million students remain affected by full or partial school closures caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
During a pandemic, restoring some form of education as quickly and safely as possible is paramount.
Restoring education has immediate benefits to the health and wellbeing of children.
There are a variety of innovative ways to deliver education during a pandemic, ranging from distance instruction with radio, television and phones to online education and reduced capacity in-person instruction.
Strong education systems promote growth, economic development and skills training, helping a country rebound more quickly from a pandemic.
Investing in health without investing in education is a non-starter.
Access to education improves health outcomes for individuals, families, and communities while better health improves an individual's chances of being educated.
Addressing health and education together is important, since the benefits are mutually reinforcing. Quality education, especially for girls, means individuals can better look after their own health and that of their children.
School-based delivery of health interventions for school-age children can be significantly more cost-effective than alternative delivery approaches.
Today’s school-aged children are tomorrow’s nurses, epidemiologists, doctors, researchers, and public health experts. Without investment in education today, there will be a shortage of 15 million health workers in 2030.