Abstract The advent of COVID-19 continues to present social and biomedical challenges that this article endeavors to explore through a systematic critical review of the literature. The article has also benefited from the researchers’ intuition and experiences they have acquired from investigating trends of SARS-CoV-2 virus dynamics. It has also benefited from engaging in informal conversations with researchers and lay people interested in addressing the myriad challenges posed by COVID-19. Findings have generated the following thematic discussions: stigma and stigmatization surrounding the disease, skewed global response, gender disparity, human rights dynamics, vaccine dynamics and dilemmas, and poverty associated with coronavirus advent. The article concludes by recognizing both biomedical and socioeconomic implications and the emerging social disparities and unequal access to pharmacotherapeutics.