Out of Harm’s Way: Adaptive Social Protection for Pandemics in South Asia

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed significant gaps in social protection systems, especially in South Asia, where financial constraints limited support for vulnerable populations. This paper emphasizes the need for adaptive social protection (ASP) systems that include pandemic-specific measures to enhance resilience and preparedness for future pandemics. The paper employs a stress-test methodology to explore the adequacy of social protection measures implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic across various South Asian countries. The results indicate that while social protection programs provided crucial support during the pandemic, there were significant disparities in coverage and effectiveness due to limited fiscal space and high borrowing costs. The study also found that countries with pre-existing scalable social protection provisions were better able to respond to the crisis, suggesting that investments in ASP are essential for future pandemic preparedness. While South Asian countries have made progress in adopting ASP, their social protection systems need to raise to the challenge posed by future pandemics.