COVID-19 and Social Injustice

There are two ways to make sense of a human tragedy: as an injustice, or as a misfortune. A misfortune is usually associated with inescapable external forces of nature, and as such the desolation it leaves in its wake is blameless. An injustice, on the other hand, is caused by fellow humans, it is intentional, controllable, and therefore not blameless. Being hit by lightning is a misfortune, living in poverty is an injustice. Contrary to what may seem, and what some politicians are telling us, Covid-19 has a lot more in common with poverty than with lightning strike. That is because Covid-19 is a case-study in injustice, not misfortune. No one is responsible for the existence of Covid-19, but collectively we are responsible for the fact that pandemic preparedness plans were grossly insufficient, and the response to the crisis inadequate. All the inequalities, biases, prejudices, and wrongs of modern society have been irrevocably exposed by Covid-19. This chapter will offer recommendations to what social, political and economic changes need to be made, domestically and globally, after this pandemic crisis is over. If everything post Covid-19 goes back to being essentially similar to what it was pre Covid-19, we will have wasted a unique opportunity to eradicate some of the worst underlying conditions of social injustice which inflict misery to billions of people across the globe.