‘Preventing Pandemics by Building Bridges in EU Policy and Law’

Abstract

A successful strategy aimed at preventing the emergence and spread of Emerging Infectious Diseases – and therefore a strategy to avoid future pandemic scenarios – should take into account the human dependency on – and profound connection with nature and include not just health considerations but also animal welfare and health, agriculture and food production, environmental protection and climate action in all their facets, including spending and finances, and trade. In this light, policy and legislative acts not only need to be sufficiently ambitious to tackle the drivers behind the emergence of infectious diseases, but they also need to work in symbiosis, in synergy, to avoid that progress made in a certain field is eroded by a lack of ambition and foresight in another field. This research article aims to shed some light on the issue by considering key areas and key recent developments in EU law and policy. It shows how approaches and stances taken by the EU and by Member States frequently lack grit and ambition and are only limitedly synergetic and coherent with each other, often representing veritable missed opportunities both in terms of ambition and in building bridges across different fields. Covid-19, zoonoses, One Health, EU health policy, animal welfare law, animal health law, CAP, EU Climate Law, climate change, environmental protection