Helping fast-growing Pacific towns battle COVID-19
The Pacific islands’ idyllic reputation contributes to perceptions that it is largely rural.
While much of Melanesia remains agricultural, it is urbanising rapidly – faster than most cities globally. A growing number of Pacific island inhabitants live in its cities and towns, and in all but a few of the Pacific Island Countries (PICs) the urbanisation growth rate exceeds the rate of rural population growth.
Capital cities, from Port Moresby to Tarawa, are roughly doubling in size every 15 years, but lack significant urban planning.
High population densities in many Pacific cities could have implications for the spread of COVID-19, particularly in Melanesia where a large portion of urban inhabitants live in informal settlements.
Currently there are no reported cases of COVID-19 in the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu, only eight in PNG, and just under 20 in Fiji. However, in a situation where there is limited testing capacity and poor health infrastructure, all these countries have prudently issued a ‘state of emergency’ and lockdowns.
‘The current situation is even more challenging for those living in informal settlements which are densely populated…‘
Every country in the world is currently discovering the trade-offs between health and economic performance. However, these economic trade-offs will be felt keenly in the already poorly performing Pacific region. This is largely due to the large numbers of people reliant on informal sectors for income, and nations that derive significant income from tourism and trade.
The negative social implications will include deepening urban poverty, food insecurity and a marked increase in domestic violence, particularly in PNG which already has some of the highest family and sexual violence rates in the world.
The current situation is even more challenging for those living in informal settlements which are densely populated and have poor access to basic services, such as health care. It is estimated that up to 50 per cent of the urban population in the Melanesia region live in informal settlements.
In addition, these numbers are likely to be even higher due to data collection challenges, old census data, the circular movement of people between rural and urban locations and the fact that peri-urban growth, which occurs outside formal city boundaries, is not included in urban census data.
Urban population numbers are hard to estimate. Similarly, obtaining accurate health data in the Pacific is also a challenge, particularly in the informal settlement context. Testing is very limited in these countries and until now have been almost non-existent in the informal settlements, even though living conditions put them at high risk.
It is telling that all four countries in the Melanesian region are excluded from a recent independent report on UN Sustainable Development Goals progress due to insufficient data. This is despite the fact that the region is well known to have considerable health challenges, including the double burden of disease and weak health infrastructure.
National governments face significant challenges in preparing responses to the threat of COVID-19. Currently there are low-numbers of infection reported in PNG but there are concerns that this masks unreported cases due to limited testing availability.
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