The event will explore how governments in South Asia are tackling COVID-19 and will focus specifically on Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.

South Asia is home to a quarter of humanity and its policy response to COVID-19 matters for the world but there are markedly different views on the policy response in South Asia. The panelists will discuss what can be learned from the South Asian experience and the challenges that lie ahead for the region.

Tania Aidrus (@taidrus) is Special Assistant to the Prime Minister, Digital Pakistan.

Yamini Aiyar (@AiyarYamini) is President and Chief Executive of the Centre for Policy Research (CPR), New Delhi. Yamini is a TED fellow and a founding member of the International Experts Panel of the Open Government Partnership. She has also been a member of the World Economic Forum’s global council on good governance. Previously, she has worked with the World Bank’s Water and Sanitation Program and Rural Development unit in Delhi. Yamini is an alumna of LSE.

Jishnu Das is Professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy and the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. Jishnu’s work focuses on health and education in low and middle-income countries, with an emphasis on social markets, or common, but complex, conflagrations of public and private education and health providers operating in a small geographical space. As part of this research, he has co-developed the largest and longest-running cohort study on learning outcomes in low-income countries and has led an agenda on the measurement of healthcare quality in low-income countries. 

Mushfiq Mobarak (@mushfiq_econ) is Professor of Economics at Yale University with concurrent appointments in the School of Management and in the Department of Economics. Mobarak is the founder and faculty director of the Yale Research Initiative on Innovation and Scale (Y-RISE). He holds other appointments at Innovations for Poverty Action, the Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) at MIT, the International Growth Centre (IGC) at LSE. Mobarak has several ongoing research projects in Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, Kenya, Malawi and Sierra Leone.

Adnan Khan (@adnanqk) is Professor in Practice at LSE's School of Public Policy. Before joining the School of Public Policy and STICERD, Professor Khan served as Research and Policy Director at the International Growth Centre at the LSE for ten years. During 2018-19, he was a Visiting Lecturer of Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.

This event is part of LSE's public event series - COVID-19: The Policy Response.

COVID-19 represents an enormous challenge for the social sciences to help governments and non-governmental organisations respond to the economic and societal consequences of the pandemic. Part of LSE's response to this challenge is a series of online public events that will take place over the Summer Term.

Why not visit the School of Public Policy COVID-19 Resource Centre.

This event in the series has been organised by LSE's Institute of Global Affairs, School of Public Policy, International Growth Centre and South Asia Centre.

The next event in this series will take place at 3.30pm on 23 June on Implications of the COVID-19 Crisis for Disability Policy.

The Institute of Global Affairs (@LSEIGA) aims to maximise the impact of LSE's leading expertise across the social sciences by shaping inclusive and locally-rooted responses to the most important and pressing global challenges.

The School of Public Policy (@LSEPublicPolicy) is an international community where ideas and practice meet. Our approach creates professionals with the ability to analyse, understand and resolve the challenges of contemporary governance.

The International Growth Centre (@The_IGC) aims to promote sustainable growth in developing countries by providing demand-led policy advice based on frontier research. 

The South Asia Centre (@SAsiaLSE) harnesses LSE's research & academic focus on Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Twitter Hashtag for this event: #LSECOVID19

Podcast & Video

A podcast of this event is available to download at COVID-19 in South Asia: Bangladesh, India and Pakistan. 

A video of this event is available to watch at COVID-19 in South Asia: Bangladesh, India and Pakistan. 

Podcasts and videos of many LSE events can be found at the LSE Public Lectures and Events: podcasts and videos channel.