‘Inequality-pandemic cycle’ must be broken to achieve health security
JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA, 3 November 2025 — A report by world-leading economists, public health experts, and political leaders released today ahead of G20 meetings, Breaking the inequality-pandemic cycle: building true health security in a global age, shows that inequality is making the world more vulnerable to pandemics.
In landmark findings based on two years of research and convenings around the world, the new report shows that high levels of inequality are linked to outbreaks becoming pandemics and that inequality is undermining national and global responses, making pandemics more disruptive, deadly, and longer in duration. The report also shows that pandemics increase inequality, fuelling a cycle that research shows is visible not just for COVID-19, but also for AIDS, Ebola, Influenza, Mpox and beyond.
Evidence gathered by the experts also shows that “inequality-informed” pandemic responses, alongside actions on inequality taken before pandemics hit, can protect the world from the next global disease crisis more effectively than current preparedness efforts. The report lays out the social determinants of pandemics and actions that can be taken to address them, linked also to communities and multi-sectoral governance. It provides recommendations for global economic policy, and access to affordable medicines. As well as strengthening preparedness for future pandemics, the proposals in the report can also help decisively end existing health crises, such as HIV, tuberculosis and Mpox.
Co-chaired by Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz, former First Lady of Namibia Monica Geingos and renowned epidemiologist Professor Sir Michael Marmot, and convened by UNAIDS, the Global Council on Inequality, AIDS and Pandemics report distils practical steps toward that governments can take, redefining “health security.”
The new findings arrive as G20 Health Ministers prepare to meet amidst reports of new and growing outbreaks internationally of Avian Flu and Mpox, and as breakthrough HIV prevention drugs are being approved by drug regulators.
Read the full press release and access the report here.
Source : UNAIDS
Get involved
Are you living with HIV/AIDS? Are you part of a community affected by HIV/AIDS and co-infections? Do you work or volunteer in the field? Are you motivated by our cause and interested to support our work?
Subscribe
Stay in the loop and get all the important EATG updates in your inbox with the EATG newsletter. The HIV & co-infections bulletin is your source of handpicked news from the field arriving regularly to your inbox.