| Resumen: |
The global pandemic has delivered to the world another stark reminder of the importance of having
comprehensive social protection systems in place to contend with shocks and manage ordinary lifecycle challenges. The crisis threw a spotlight on the precarious plight of the 4.1 billion people who have no social protection at all and highlighted in particular the difficulties of reaching the 2 billion informal economy workers and their families with COVID-19 social protection response measures. It also underscored the important role played in the spread of disease by income insecurity and a lacK of financial access to healthcare, and the inequities in infection, morbidity and mortality. We saw that low-income and marginalized people were especially affected, in particular children and women, as well as those facing insecure income as informal workers and in precarious employment. These profound inequities documented during COVID-19 affected health outcomes for infection, COVID-19 complications and mortality, with those worse-off in society affected by a factor of 2 to 4 times more than the better-off. A clear bright spot, however, has been the crucial role that social protection has played in an unprecedented policy response worldwide. Undoubtedly, without this massive and rapid expansion of social protection through pre-existing provision and the introduction of emergency measures, the human and socio-economic toll of the crisis would have been much, much, greater. This recognition has resulted in a renewed appreciation of universal social protection and the need for sustainable systems; and the indispensability of such systems as a cornerstone of all socially-just, healthy and well-functioning
societies has become more self-evident. Moreover, the pandemic gave a timely jolt to the UN family and development partners alike, an urgent prompt to build further on joint work on strengthening social protection systems, and to redouble our efforts in this regard. In so doing, we can draw on our common human rights framework, and on international social security standards, which provide concrete guidance for the building of universal and robust social protection systems; on a common vision of the Importance of universal social protection and health coverage, in enabling people to flourish in life and health; on a common inter-agency statement on the crucial role of social protection for pandemic control; and also on our respective strengths and technical expertise, to maximize the support we can provide to governments to realize their social protection ambitions and ensure that those people who do not currently enjoy effective access to social protection soon will. The recent launch of the Global Accelerator on Jobs and Social Protection for Just Transitions is an expression of this strengthened commitment of a collaborative UN to support countries in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and to be as fully as possible prepared to address the multiple crises and transformations of the twenty-first century. This publication, therefore, appears at an opportune moment: first, it sets out agreed priority policy areas that require dedicated action now; and second, it puts forward several practical recommendations on how UN collaboration in this domain can be further enhanced – quick wins that are practically attainable now. |
