The Global Health Policies of the EU and its Member States: A Common Vision?

Lies Steurs,Remco Van De Pas,Sarah Delputte,Jan Orbie

doi:10.15171/ijhpm.2017.112

Abstract

Background: This article assesses the global health policies of the European Union (EU) and those of its individual member states. So far EU and public health scholars have paid little heed to this, despite the large budgets involved in this area. While the European Commission has attempted to define the ‘EU role in Global Health’ in 2010, member states are active in the domain of global health as well. Therefore, this article raises the question to what extent a common ‘EU’ vision on global health exists. Methods: This is examined through a comparative framing analysis of the global health policy documents of the European Commission and five EU member states (France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Belgium, and Denmark). The analysis is informed by a two-layered typology, distinguishing global health from international health and four ‘global health frames,’ namely social justice, security, investment and charity. Results: The findings show that the concept of ‘global health’ has not gained ground the same way within European policy documents. Consequently, there are also differences in how health is being framed. While the European Commission, Belgium, and Denmark clearly support a social justice frame, the global health strategies of the United Kingdom, Germany, and France put an additional focus on the security and investment frames. Conclusion: There are different understandings of global/international health as well as different framings within relevant documents of the EU and its member states. Therefore, the existence of an ‘EU’ vision on global health is questionable. Further research is needed on how this impacts on policy implementation.

Highlights

During the past 20 years health has increasingly gained importance on the global policy agenda
The Notion of ‘Global Health’ Within the European Union With regards to how the external dimension of health is perceived – the distinction between ‘international health’ and ‘global health’ – we find that there are two groups among the selected donors and that this corresponds to the institutional actors involved in the formulation of the strategy
This article aimed to analyze to what extent a common ‘European Union (EU)’ vision in global health might have emerged? In order to answer this question, we engaged in a framing analysis of relevant policy documents of the European Commission, the United Kingdom, France, Denmark, Belgium, and Germany

Summary

Introduction

During the past 20 years health has increasingly gained importance on the global policy agenda. In 2007 the importance of a European contribution to the global health debate was recognized in a white paper stating that “in our globalized world, it is hard to separate national or EU-wide actions from the global sphere, as global health issues have an impact on internal community health policy and vice versa.”[5] Recognizing that global health is influenced by several policy domains, the Directorate-General (DG) Health, DG Development and DG Research initiated a consultation process with several stakeholders in 2009, which resulted in the launch of a Commission communication on the EU Role in Global Health in 2010.6 This document stated that “the EU should apply the common values and principles of solidarity towards equitable and universal coverage of quality health services in all external and internal policies and actions.”[6] By focusing on universal coverage of basic quality care, health systems strengthening and policy coherence, it proposed a clear vision on global health This message was confirmed by subsequent Council conclusions.[7] These attempts of the EU to claim a role in global health can be seen as part of ongoing efforts to ‘europeanize’

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