COVID-CAS Research project

November 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the global economies, health care systems and social structures. The Dutch Caribbean Islands have not been spared as the tourism, a key pillar for the economies of Aruba, Curacao and Sint-Martin rates, have dropped and have still to recover to the pre-COVID levels. The consequences amounting to economic crises on all islands along with strained health-care systems, social structures, and living standards. Vulnerable low-income families, the elderly, women and (undocumented) migrants have particularly been hit hard by the pandemic.

The COVID-CAS research project aims to look at how vulnerable low-income families, and in particular women, the elderly and (undocumented) migrants, have experienced the pandemic and the interventions taken by the governments to prevent the spread of the virus and to mitigate the negative consequences brought about by pandemic. Furthermore this research projects aims to investigate and provide recommendations on hot to better reach and help vulnerable families during future outbreaks or (health) crisis situations.

For the purpose of this research ‘vulnerable families’ are defined as low-income households of three or more persons with a collective income <3500 Aruban florins per month 3 persons, without or with limited access to welfare or other forms of assistance. We have further identified three types of persons within these households: Women, the elderly and (undocumented) migrants. The research which will be carried out on all the three islands, adopts a human rights-based approach as a primacy focal point for investigating the social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on quality of life and resilience of vulnerable families in the Dutch Caribbean. This research uses mixed- methods to collect and analyze the relevant information, consisting of desk research, in-depth interviews and focus group discussion. The desk research on the COVID-19 responses and innervations on all islands will be complemented with 90 in-depth interviews with vulnerable families. The focus of the in-depth interviews is on collecting information about people’s motivation, experiences, thoughts and perceptions. These interviews will be complemented by in-depth interviews with volunteers from NGOs that provided aid during the pandemic such as the Red Cross and HIAS and focus group discussion with relevant stakeholders such as policy and law makers, ministries, experts, health-care professionals, educators etc. This research is funded by ZonMW ( a Dutch organization for scientific research) started in March 2021 and is carried out by a team of researchers from the: Curacao Biomedical & Health Research Institute, University of Aruba, University of Curacao, University of Sint-Maarten and University of Utrecht.