We are pleased to present the Stratbase ADR Institute Occasional Paper for the month of February 2021, entitled, “Extended COVID-19 Crisis: An Issue of Governance and Health System Management”.

Highly relevant to this pandemic time, this paper aims to bring the policies and plans of the Philippines into focus: what they are, how they ought to have been implemented, and ultimately, how their failure contributed to the present slump in our economy and continued public health crisis. Also, it seeks to juxtapose the COVID response situation with the public perception of the government and its plans with the hope of initiating conversations on data-backed policies and improved response systems.

Relative to the Stratbase advocacy on transparent and accountable governance, the discussions provided in the paper are suggestive of far-reaching social, economic, and governance reforms through a whole-of-society approach. Only in this manner can the benefits of Philippine government crisis response be felt by the people.