One Step Forward, How Many Steps Back? Benchmarking the US Covid-19 Pandemic Response Against United Nations Sustainable Development Target 3.3

In 2015, the United Nations adopted 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs), mapping out specific targets to work toward in order to achieve worldwide peace and prosperity. SDG 3 promotes healthy living, while target 3.3 strives to end epidemics of various infectious diseases. In this project, I examine how the Covid-19 outbreak impacted the US’s progress toward SDG target 3.3, analyzing both academic literature and government documents in the form of a literature review. I discuss trends and flaws in the US pandemic response, briefly contrasting US containment measures with Singapore’s, before examining the pandemic’s effects on incidence rates and service outcomes for two communicable diseases — tuberculosis and HIV. Although a lack of internal and external coordination, the federalist structure of the US government, inflexible funding, and politicization of infectious disease control prevented the CDC from responding to the pandemic effectively, tuberculosis incidence rates dropped in 2020 due to less face-to-face contact and possible missed diagnoses, while HIV services experienced a rebound in late 2020 due to self test, telehealth, and antiretroviral therapy home delivery services. While Covid-19 did not dismantle the US’s progress toward UN SDG target 3.3, greater communication, deeper public understanding, and an ability to expect the unexpected would accelerate the US’s movement toward effective management of communicable diseases.