She was just 12 when she dropped out of school and began clocking in for endless shifts at one of the garment factories springing up in Bangladesh, hoping to pull her family out of poverty.

Her fingers ached from stitching pants and shirts destined for sale in the United States and Europe, but the $30 the young woman made each month meant that for the first time, her family had regular meals, even luxuries like chicken and milk.

A decade later, she was providing a better life for her own child than she had ever imagined.

Then the world locked down, and Shahida Khatun, like millions of low-wage workers around the world, found herself back in the poverty she thought she had left behind.

In a matter of mere months, the coronavirus has wiped out global gains that took two decades to achieve, leaving an estimated two billion people at risk of abject poverty. However indiscriminate the virus may be in its spread, it has repeatedly proven itself anything but that when it comes to its effect on the world's most vulnerable communities.