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Journal of Human Development and Capabilities
A Multi-Disciplinary Journal for People-Centered Development
Volume 21, 2020 - Issue 3
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Policy Forum

Human Capabilities and Pandemics

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Pages 280-286 | Published online: 30 Jun 2020
 

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has altered the course of nations, and threatens to erase significant achievements in development. These achievements have been partially motivated by the Capabilities Approach. To stem the widening and entrenchment of inequalities as so happens after epidemics and pandemics reflected in history, policy makers must understand and apply the CA to the COVID-19 response. Three aspects of the CA, including its critique of dominant paradigms and policies affecting human wellbeing, the conception of wellbeing as capabilities, and normative argument for every human being's equal moral claims to capabilities are discussed in relation to the spread of COVID-19 and the spectrum of social responses.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

About the Author

Sridhar Venkatapuram is an academic-practitioner in global health ethics and justice. He is an Associate Professor at King’s College London, and Director of Global Health Education and Training at the King’s Global Health Institute. His inter-disciplinary training includes international relations (Brown), history (SOAS) global public health (Harvard), sociology, and political philosophy (Cambridge). He has worked with organizations including Human Rights Watch, the Population Council, Open Societies Institute, UK Parliament Office of Science & Technology, and recently, the World Health Organization. He is a member of the Independent Panel on Global Governance for Health, a trustee of Medact, and a fellow of the Salzburg Global Seminar, the RSA, and UK Faculty of Public Health, among others. His PhD was an argument for every human being’s moral right to health, examined and passed without corrections by Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen and Tania Burchardt. It was the basis of his first book titled Health Justice: An Argument from the Capability Approach (Polity Press). He publishes in diverse scholarly journals on public and global health ethics, social determinants of health, the capabilities approach, health equity, and global governance for health. His Twitter handle is @sridhartweet.

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