Zimbabwe’s first confirmed Covid-19 case was announced on March 20, and the first death on March 23. Ten days later, the government, through the promulgation of a series of statutory instruments such as statutory instrument 83, announced a prevention, containment and treatment emergency response that began with a 21-day nationwide lockdown.

This arrived in the context of a country already crippled by hyper-inflation, health system deficiencies, production stagnation, crop failure, mass unemployment and basic service delivery failures...