COVID Big Picture Reflection Lessons Learned Report

The COVID-19 pandemic was a public health emergency with second-order effects that extended beyond the health sector. In 2022, USAID’s Bureau for Planning, Learning, and Resource Management (PLR)—formerly the Bureau for Policy, Planning, and Learning (PPL)—conducted a COVID-19 Big Picture Reflection (BPR), the first ever Agency-wide pause and reflect exercise around a critical priority. The BPR was an iterative process that USAID used to triangulate and analyze various sources of evidence and learning on the response and adaptations to mitigate COVID-19’s impact, with special emphasis on the second-order effects. The main goal for the BPR was to consolidate findings from the evidence and generate lessons learned to inform USAID’s future decision making on crisis readiness and response. This report summarizes eight key lessons learned from the COVID-19 BPR.