Giving Compass' Take:

• An article at Brookings calls upon world leaders to emphasize strengthening our COVID-19 response in nations in need of immediate emergency action.

• How does strengthening our COVID-19 response require collaboration between world leaders across the planet? What can we learn about the impact of wealthier nations on marginalized communities? What can you do to help strengthen the COVID-19 response effort?

• Learn more about your role in strengthening our COVID-19 response right away.

G-20 leaders urgently need to reconvene to agree on an enhanced and more strongly coordinated global response to the COVID-19 crisis. Although lockdowns are being eased in many places, the daily number of new COVID-19 cases worldwide recently reached its highest level yet, while the pandemic’s devastating economic toll continues to mount as new epicenters arise in the emerging and developing world.

We are at a critical moment, because the poorest countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America are facing economic and public-health emergencies that demand immediate action. A diverse group of middle-income economies need help, too. Together, these countries represent nearly 70 percent of the world’s population and account for approximately one-third of global GDP.

Indeed, a global recession could reverse up to three decades of improvements in living standards and, according to one estimate, push 420 million to 580 million people worldwide into poverty. The World Food Program, moreover, has warned that COVID-19 will likely double the number of people suffering from acute hunger, to 265 million.

The pandemic has also given rise to the greatest education emergency of our lifetime, with 1.7 billion children—more than 90 percent of the global total—having been out of school because of lockdowns. In poor countries, many may never go back. Millions of children who no longer receive school meals are going hungry, and cash-strapped governments are reducing education aid.

This global economic and social emergency will not end until we overcome the global health emergency. And that will require overcoming it in all countries.

So, while we welcome the good intentions at the heart of the G-20’s COVID-19 action plan, world leaders must do more.

Read the full article about strengthening our COVID-19 response in the poorest countries at Brookings.