This study examines factors associated with an increasingly poor perception of the novel coronavirus in Africa using a designed electronic questionnaire to collect perception-based information from participants across Africa from twenty-one African countries (and from all five regions of Africa) between 1 and 25 February 2022. The study received 66.7% of responses from West Africa, 12.7% from Central Africa, 4.6% from Southern Africa, 15% from East Africa, and 1% from North Africa. The majority of the participants are Nigerians (56%), 14.1% are Cameroonians, 8.7% are Ghanaians, 9.3% are Kenyans, 2% are South Africans, 2.1% are DR-Congolese, 1.6% are Tanzanians, 1.2% are Rwandans, 0.4% are Burundians, and others are Botswana’s, Chadians, Comoros, Congolese, Gambians, Malawians, South Sudanese, Sierra Leoneans, Ugandans, Zambians, and Zimbabweans. All responses were coded on a five-point Likert scale. The study adopts descriptive statistics, principal component analysis, and binary logistic regression analysis for the data analysis. The descriptive analysis of the study shows that the level of ignorance or poor “perception” of COVID-19 in Africa is very high (87% of individuals sampled). It leads to skepticism towards complying with preventive measures as advised by the WHO and directed by the national government across Africa. We adopted logistic regression analysis to identify the factors associated with a poor perception of the virus in Africa. The study finds that religion (belief or faith) and media misinformation are the two leading significant causes of ignorance or poor “perception” of COVID-19 in Africa, with log odd of 0.4775 (resulting in 1.6120 odd ratios) and 1.3155 (resulting in 3.7265 odd ratios), respectively. The study concludes that if the poor attitude or perception towards complying with the preventive measures continues, COVID-19 cases in Africa may increase beyond the current spread.

Financial inclusion and social protection have been recognised as the primary essential stimuli from the potential they carry as avenues for economic development, especially with respect to reduction in poverty and inequalities, the creation of employment and the enhancement overall welfare and livelihood. However, inclusive access to financial resources and equitable access to social protection interventions have remained a significant concern in Nigeria. In addition, the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the weakness of Nigeria in all sectors of the economy such as energy, health, education and food systems and low-level inclusive access to financial resources and social protection coverage. On the other hand, this study argues that financial inclusion and social protection has the potential to mitigation shocks orchestrated by the COVID-19 pandemic. This study empirically examines how social protection interventions and access to financial resources responded to COVID-19 pandemic. The study made use of data sourced from the World Bank’s COVID-19 national longitudinal phone survey 2020 and applied the logit regression. The findings show that social protection and access to financial resources significantly associated with the likelihood of shock mitigation during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results show that social protection intervention reduces the probability of being severely affected by shocks by 0.431. Given this result, the study recommends that the government should put more effort into proper social protection intervention to mitigate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic.

When COVID-19 hit all the Asian countries, Indonesia issued various laws and regulations. This study investigates these laws that do not improve the country’s ability to increase its adaptive structuration and foresight-oriented investment. It analyzes all the new laws, which should be based on the requirements of both concepts. It considers that all the laws are intended to defend the Government of Indonesia’s economic performance (GoI). It means that all the established regulations were built on the premise that they only focused on national economic preservation, especially economic growth. In other words, this study stated that the absence of regulations containing adaptive restructuration and foresight-oriented investment would decrease the state’s agility. This absence potentially impacts Indonesia to zcategorize the future as the state’s political failure. It shows evidence that Indonesia could not enforce and empower its structural potential. This study indicates that Indonesia made no foresight-oriented investment to cover the disbursed costs due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Future policies should be improved by including growth opportunities to enhance Indonesia’s agility. This agility could finally be achieved when all the laws issued by the GoI do not contain the praxis.

The COVID-19 pandemic has instigated global lockdowns, profoundly altering daily life and resulting in widespread closures, except for essential services like healthcare and grocery stores. This scenario has notably intensified mental health challenges, particularly among children and adolescents. Influenced by a myriad of factors including developmental stages, educational backgrounds, existing psychiatric disorders, and socioeconomic status, the pandemic’s impact extends beyond the immediate health crisis. This paper critically examines the multifaceted effects of the pandemic on mental and physical health across various age groups. It highlights the increased incidence of stress, anxiety, and depression, underscoring the pandemic’s deep psychological footprint. Additionally, the paper explores the societal implications, from altered family dynamics and educational disruptions due to the shift to online learning, to workplace transformations. These changes have led to a mix of adaptive responses and adverse effects, including heightened domestic tensions and mental health issues. The paper also delves into the ethical challenges faced by medical professionals during this crisis, balancing urgent patient care with ongoing medical research and mental health considerations. This analysis aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of the COVID-19 pandemic’s extensive impact on health and society, emphasizing the importance of addressing mental health as a crucial component of the response strategy.

Studies show that Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) technologies can enhance compliance with COVID-19 guidelines within the parties in the construction industry in the future and mitigate job loss. It implies that mitigating job loss improves the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 1 (SDG 1) (eliminate poverty). There is a paucity of literature concerning 4IR technologies application and COVID-19 impact on South Africa’s construction industry. Thus, this paper investigates the impacts of the pandemic on the sector and the roles of digital technologies in mitigating job loss in future pandemics. Data were collected via virtual semi-structured interviews. The participants proffered unexplored insights into the impact of the pandemic on the sector and the possible roles that 4IR technology can play in mitigating the spread of the virus within the sector. Findings show that the sector was hit, especially the low-income earners, threatens to achieve Goal 1, despite government institutions’ intervention, such as economic support programmes, health and safety guidelines awareness, and medical facilities. Findings group the emerged impacts into health and safety, environmental, economic, productivity, social, and legal and insurance issues in South Africa. The study shows that technology can be advantageous to improving achieving Goal 1 in a pandemic era due to limited job loss.