The European Union Confronts COVID-19

Abstract

Issue The politics of European Union (EU) health policy are also the politics of European integration. Debate about EU policies always entails debate about the appropriate role and powers granted to the EU. Description From some angles, the EU looks more like a federation (ex EUA), deeply entrenched in its citizens' lives. It has a powerful shared culture among leaders and strong, entrepreneurial, and statelike political institutions. Its legal system is entwined with member state law to such an extent that member state courts have driven legal integration and change as much as EU institutions, both in general and in health. From another angle, it still looks like an international organization (ex WHO) or a regional trade block (ex Mercosur). We ask what policy a member state might make, but, in the case of the EU, many ask if the EU should have a policy at all. Should it respond, and, if so, how and to whose benefit? Results Like international organizations or confederations, though, the EU responds primarily to and is shaped by the demands of its member states. They have actively maintained this dichotomous structure so as to prevent transfer of power and loss of sovereignty. Member states ultimately determine the direction of the EU, and they have supported EU expansion only when they require a “European rescue of the nation state”. Lessons The EU's weak public health and social policy responses to the crisis reflect this effort on the part of member states to limit its role over the decades, whereas the major expansion in its role over the summer of 2020 reflects the perceived interests of member states, which now seek another European rescue of the nation state. Main messages This crisis of COVID-19 leave behind a different EU. Between the redefinition in salience, resource, and law of public health, shared European actions and the development of EU debt for member states, it is likely that a step forward promoted integration in health and beyond.