Building Community Resilience for Future Epidemics

As countries around the world strengthen their defenses to combat the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, it has become evident that the collective actions and behaviors of people are crucial to success. This essay explores the importance of social ties and connections in building reservoirs of resilience for future epidemics.

Social Infrastructure and Shocks

Cities regularly face stressors and shocks, some of which occur with predictable frequency, such as climate change-induced extreme weather events like typhoons, hurricanes, and flooding. Other shocks are less predictable, such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed over 1.3 million lives globally.

When considering how planners and decision-makers can mitigate the impact of such events, the first things that come to mind are often physical defenses—walls, plexiglass shields, and other elements of the built environment. These types of physical infrastructure, which include defenses against tsunamis, flooding, and disease, are the most visible means of reducing damage from shocks. For example, if there is concern that seawater will regularly inundate a residential area near the coast, engineers might design and construct a seawall to keep the community dry.

While physical infrastructure is an obvious and well-established component within the toolkit of many city planners, another type—social infrastructure—may play an even more critical role.

Social infrastructure refers to the interpersonal connections that bind people together. Whether it’s neighbor-to-neighbor interactions or relationships between local business owners and elected leaders, societies rely on these networks of ties to function effectively under all circumstances. These connections come in various forms, depending on the types of individuals they link.

Source:

https://www.clc.gov.sg/docs/default-source/urban-solutions/urbsol18pdf/10_essay_futureepidemics.pdf