South Caucasus and COVID-19: Vulnerabilities, Setbacks, Responses

Abstract

This chapter discusses the impact and implications of the COVID-19 pandemic in the South Caucasus. In the framework of the main argument that multiple regional vulnerabilities and setbacks in healthcare systems and economic capacity inherited from the Soviet era shaped the response capacity of the regional actors with the outbreak of the pandemic, it first provides an account of the pre-pandemic background conditions in these spheres in Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, going back to the Soviet period. It then explores the post-1991 and pandemic period conditions in respect of the same actors in the same spheres, maintaining that the pandemic exacerbated the earlier vulnerabilities and led to limited responses. The final analysis affirms the findings and offers some recommendations for the future.