Gordon Brown has warned that a second or third wave of coronavirus infection could emanate from poor countries with undeveloped health systems, saying the risks can be controlled only by coordinated international action. The global crisis of the Covid-19 pandemic will not end until it is “eradicated in every continent”, the former prime minister said. “It is in all our interests to prevent a second or third wave starting in the poorest, least protected countries with the most underdeveloped health systems. So a threat to others is a threat to us, and we help ourselves by helping others. Protecting ourselves locally means we need to act globally,” Brown wrote in the foreword to a report by the international development charity Christian Aid. “Today we face a global medical emergency, and we cannot end the coronavirus pandemic unless it is eradicated in every continent.” The report, Tipping point: how the Covid-19 pandemic threatens to push the world’s poorest to the brink of survival, warns that the world’s poorest countries are ill-equipped to cope with the impact of the disease. Countries already dealing with endemic poverty, protracted humanitarian crises, long-running conflict, food insecurity, economic shocks, displacement and underfunded health systems are especially at risk. The report, published during Christian Aid Week, looks at the consequences of the pandemic in four countries. It says: Sierra Leone is still recovering from the deadly Ebola epidemic that started in 2014, which killed one in five of the country’s health workers. Debt cancellation would allow the government to spend more on its response to Covid. In Bangladesh, more than 850,000 Rohingya refugees living in camps in Cox’s Bazar after being forcibly displaced from Myanmar are at grave risk from the pandemic. South Sudan is one of the countries in the world most vulnerable to Covid, with a humanitarian crisis driven by years of protracted conflict. In Gaza, the economic crisis resulting from a 13-year blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt has been exacerbated by the pandemic and has triggered a spike in human rights violations. Christian Aid is calling for faith leaders to actively engage in minimising the spread of Covid-19; a comprehensive debt cancellation deal for the poorest countries; and for donors to safeguard current humanitarian work across the world. Patrick Watt, Christian Aid’s policy and campaigns director, said: “Covid-19 has exposed the deep faultlines in societies, and the ways in which our economy is broken. Without concerted action, the pandemic threatens to deepen those inequalities, and set back the fight against poverty by a generation. “By taking steps now to minimise the spread of the virus, mitigate the worst effects on people’s livelihoods, and protect existing humanitarian work, governments and civil society can prevent a crisis from escalating into a catastrophe.”