Strict containment limits the spread of pandemics but is difficult to achieve when people must continue to work to avoid poverty. A new role is emerging for income support: by enabling people to effectively stay home, it can produce substantial health externalities. We examine this issue using...

This Working Paper presents an analysis into the adequacy of Pakistan’s social protection response to the COVID-19 pandemic and highlights pertinent policy takeaways for turning the health crisis into an opportunity for a strengthened social protection system in Pakistan. It focuses on Ehsaas...

Poverty simulations suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic and the measures implemented by the government to contain the spread of the virus will increase the number of poor in the country. As such, various social safety nets were implemented by both the national and local government agencies to...

This paper makes a set of estimates for the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on poverty incidence, intensity, and severity in developing countries and on the distribution of global poverty. We conclude there could be increases in poverty of a substantial magnitude-up to 400 million new...