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The COVID-19 pandemic, and the responses to it that were required from frontline healthcare providers and others working in healthcare settings including environmental, clerical, and security staff, has challenged our healthcare systems in unprecedented ways. The threats to the financial, physical, and psychological well-being of healthcare professionals – many of whom entered the field due at least in part to a deep commitment to caring for and helping others – will have profound and long-lasting personal and professional impacts. Early in the pandemic response, healthcare professionals knew little about the risks they, their patients, and their loved ones faced from COVID-19 as they operated under crisis standards of care and without adequate supplies of personal protective equipment. As the pandemic response progressed, the lack of clear, science-based guidance, and the politicization of the pandemic presented new medical, ethical, and moral dilemmas. New psychological support mechanisms, including crisis counseling and evidence-based interventions, are needed for all workers in healthcare settings, regardless of their job role.

The significance of investing in healthcare has been recognised during the COVID-19 period more than ever before across the globe. The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed inefficiency in the healthcare systems of many African countries which have resulted in the death of many people including healthcare workers who contracted the virus due to lack of protective equipment. Many African countries have not adequately invested in healthcare systems to prevent and urgently tackle the outbreaks of pandemics. This explains their unpreparedness to immediately address the COVID-19 pandemic that has ravaged many leading to the loss of lives. These challenges, therefore, have created the need to reflect and rethink concerted approaches to tackle this health hiccup. Consequently, this chapter discusses healthcare system challenges that have inhibited the delivery of good healthcare as well as issues of inequality in the provision of healthcare. The chapter explores the solutions to the identified challenges that can be adopted for better functioning of the healthcare system and provision of good healthcare. The chapter discusses how it costs the governments when they don't improve the healthcare systems. These costs are in form of increased strikes over demand for better remunerations, loss of manpower due to brain drain, loss of foreign currency that would come from medical tourism as well as loss of money in form of medical expenses abroad. It also highlights the benefits that accrue from improved healthcare systems. The chapter debates issues of morality about operations of private healthcare facilities and recommends appropriate measures that should be taken for better performance. The chapter recommends to the developing countries with meager resources the best model that can be adapted to better manage future pandemics, taking into account the environmental, cultural and demographic differences. The lessons that readers will pick from this chapter will go a long way in building healthcare systems that protect and shield the population against any future epidemics.

Much of the research on the mental health impacts of the COVID-19 response have been focused on frontline healthcare workers (FHCW). However, other essential workers (OEW) have also faced many mental health challenges due to exposures associated with their employment status, which may be compounded by higher levels of social vulnerability. This chapter describes disparities among FHCW, OEW, and the general public regarding mental health outcomes associated with the pandemic. In addition, it considers the role that structural racism (e.g., historical redlining of neighborhoods and biased lending practices) plays in the higher vulnerability of OEW to the mental health impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic response. Mental health inequities overall, and among essential workers, must be addressed as part of the recovery from COVID-19 to build resilience to future public health emergencies. The model used by New York City to more equitably distribute mental health resources and support services is shared.

The concept of “Workplace Spirituality (WPS)” in the field of management has gained great interest in the last decade, especially due to its connection with profitability. There has been a rapid increase in research related to the topic. It is assumed that employees who spend a significant part of their time at work are willing to satisfy their spiritual needs at the workplace. Such unprecedented challenges as the COVID-19 pandemic have posed many difficulties for organizations to remain agile, develop and grow, and innovate to survive. At this very moment, the importance and meaning of WPS for managers appear to have increased even more. Workplace spirituality is related to motivation, belongingness, and loyalty, and the pandemic seems to have created significant issues concerning these topics with employees. Employees have been forced to work from home due to prolonged restrictions and have faced difficulties in returning to work post-pandemic. Workplace spirituality has the potential to help employees stay motivated in their work, increase their job performance, enhance job satisfaction, and improve their mental health during this difficult period. Organizations can support their employees by implementing different practices to develop workplace spirituality. In this article, approaches to satisfy the spiritual needs of employees post-pandemic, and the efforts of workplaces to meet these needs, are examined with insights from theoretical and practical life.

This chapter provides a comprehensive examination of the diverse strategies employed in various Asian regions to address family planning. Beginning with an in-depth analysis of family planning programs in South Asia, this chapter offers a comparative overview that highlights the unique characteristics and outcomes within this dynamic context. Furthermore, this chapter employs case studies to explore the multifaceted influences of religious beliefs, legal frameworks, and sociocultural factors on family planning practices. By delving into these complexities, it offers a nuanced understanding of the challenges and successes in different Asian regions. This comparative exploration equips policymakers and practitioners with valuable insights to inform more effective and culturally sensitive family planning initiatives.

The incentives for organizations to practice good corporate citizenship include social expectations and pressures, the ingrained values of corporate leaders, and citizenship's contributions to business performance. In addition, healthcare organizations have a unique citizenship incentive because of the relationship between practicing corporate citizenship and achieving the core, health-enhancing purposes of these organizations. A template of six organization behaviors that have been empirically determined to be widely used citizenship-related behaviors is described, along with how a large healthcare organization exhibits these behaviors. A three-step process is described through which healthcare organizations can build competence in corporate citizenship by (1) incorporating citizenship commitments into their missions and giving citizenship a high priority; (2) organizing to build competence in corporate citizenship, and to facilitate and sustain citizenship performance; and (3) maintaining commitment to citizenship competence and increasing citizenship performance by conducting periodic citizenship audits, and acting on the results.

The population is aging. The desire to remain in one’s own home through the aging process appears universal. Home health caregivers provide a vital role in allowing people to age in place. Women, and in particular immigrant women, have become the face of home health caregivers. Caregiving is generational. Paid caregiving is viewed as a natural extension of a skill set women have used most of their adult life. Home health caregivers view their work as a continuation of their roles in the family and they often frame their work as providing services that family members cannot, or will not perform. Reimbursement for these services is problematic. Assigning a monetary value to caregiving seems callous, and as a result caregivers are underpaid and undervalued. Global push–pull factors and the creation of a gray economy also contribute to a devaluation of these jobs. Caregivers themselves are poor advocates for better pay and working conditions because they believe it commodifies a kinship like experience. The future of caregiving is problematic. Poor countries will suffer greatly exporting their women; rich countries will need a tremendous number of caregivers to match their demographics and women will be overwhelmed providing care for others and themselves.

The new post-pandemic normal reveals challenging features of living through a crisis, including a heightened sense of fear and the awareness of one’s limitations. Some of the challenges have been identified as relating to shifts in employer–employee interfaces or doctor–patient interactions; to increased effort to embrace rapid digitalisation while maintaining interpersonal relations; and to increased pressure to adapt flexibly to financial and structural changes. These are embedded in a greater (and mostly positive) consciousness of human and organisational interconnectedness.

This chapter looks at the parallel experiences of business and health systems as they endeavour to thrive during and beyond a pandemic. The authors recognise the intricate relationship between businesses and health as they feed each other’s overall growth directly or indirectly. Businesses create wealth through a healthy regard for the well-being of their stakeholders while healthcare systems are affected by their own business structures. In both cases, responsible leadership and fairness help to avoid an unhealthy prioritisation of profit.

This chapter reflects on the various routes businesses and health care can take to preserve fairness through ethical leadership. The authors focus on six stakeholders (employee, customer, shareholder, society or community, environment, and creditors) who need to be appropriately cared for and prioritised. The authors consider how promoting human competencies can affect skill acquisition, emotional intelligence, spiritual, and moral growth in both spaces. At the core of our discussion is the concept of self-leadership, which boosts the organisational leadership that in turn determines the kind of future we will have in the new normal.

COVID-19 has created an unprecedented situation for Finland like never before. These are desperate times for Finland. And desperate times need desperate measures. The Government of Finland is pulling out all the stops and doing everything possible in its continued fight against COVID-19 virus. The crisis primarily erupted due to the initial delay in action and lack of preparedness required to tackle this kind of crisis. Communication channels were put to best use by the Finnish Government in an effort to reach out to all the people in Finland. The people living in Finland should strictly follow the guidelines and support the measures by the Government in full tandem to ensure that the COVID-19 virus is defeated and stops further transmission by breaking the chain. This paper portrays different possible trajectories and outcomes associated with the impacts of the pandemic in Finland.