Abstract
The covid 19 pandemic was quite challenging for policy makers in that it presented both an economic
and health crisis. This meant that policy makers had to strike a balance between saving lives and
protecting livelihoods. Against this backdrop, the primary goal of this study is to examine the
economic fallout of covid 19 in South Africa. On the education front, the study finds that
nearly 15% (2 million) of public-school pupils did not return to school post covid 19.
Furthermore, the study finds that the covid 19 pandemic exacerbated the entrenched digital divide
in the education system. As regards the economic implications of the covid 19 pandemic, the study
found that business liquidations increased by as much as 48.9% following the outbreak of the
covid 19 pandemic. Even worse, the total number of civil summonses issued for debt
increased by 28.9% in the three months ending July 2021 compared to July 2020. Meanwhile, the value
of civil judgements recorded for debt doubled from R483 million to R855 million during the
same period. This indicates that following the outbreak of covid 19, a significant number of
citizens were facing a litany of cash flow challenges amid reductions in salaries and forced
retrenchments, hence the default in loan repayments. There remains a strong need for epidemic
preparedness given that disease outbreaks are not likely to disappear in the near future. This
can be achieved by harnessing lessons from previous
pandemics and establishing effective surveillance and response systems.