Diana Mitlin, principal researcher in the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)’s Human Settlements research group, looks at the particular challenges the COVID-19 outbreak will pose to people living in informal settlements, what steps can be taken to reach the populations in need, and how community organisation networks can be supported to scale up their efforts.
The global spread of COVID-19 poses particular risks for the one billion people living in informal urban settlements in the global South. A range of factors make transition of the virus more likely and strategies to tackle it extremely difficult to implement.
Despite these challenges, she argues, this is an opportunity to forge new partnerships between agencies that – if they work together – can reach the populations in need.