The COVID19 pandemic has put healthcare systems under an unprecedented pressure. It has uncovered great deficiencies in the health systems of many European countries after years of underfunding and cuts. It has discovered the fragility of multilateral institutions and global collaboration. And it has also brought to light the need to review the European competencies in public health. No country can face alone a crisis like the current one in the globalized world we live in. The need for global coordination and collaboration through health diplomacy becomes essential to prosper into the near future.
In the first phases of the pandemic, some countries were tempted to engage in export restrictions to protect domestic supply of medicines and medical devices. This contributed to slow down the crisis response in its most critical moments. Even if some of the supply problems have been solved, others persist. Furthermore, there are still some countries and regions facing shortages of protection material and medical equipment. Differences in the numbers of diagnostic tests (PCR) performed per million of habitants and inaccuracies in the counting of deaths prevent the availability of significant statistics at EU level, essential to understand the progressing of the pandemic in the territory and the efficacy of the measures taken.
Most Member States do not have the capacity to produce essential medical equipment and active products to face this pandemic and depend greatly on imports from third countries such as China, India and the USA. On this basis, the EU has put in place a mechanism of joint procurement for medical equipment that should be strengthened for procuring new medicines and medical devices. This reinforced mechanism would secure a more equitable access, an improved security of supply and more balanced prices and will be of the utmost importance when a vaccine and/or new treatments for COVID-19 will be ready in the market, making it available to all citizens.
We need stronger leadership from the European Union in the form of a European Health Union. We need to strengthen our health systems and ensure they can cope with health emergencies without collapsing. To that purpose, it is essential to perform stress tests of national health systems, i.e. to verify their capacity to face high-pressure scenarios. Based on the findings of the stress tests, the Commission should propose a Directive on minimum standards in healthcare using parameters such as hospital beds per head, critical care capacities, numbers of doctors and nurses per head, rate of health expenditure and access and affordability of healthcare for all, including for vulnerable populations. Even if Member States were reluctant to share their health competencies with the EU, this new Directive could build on a minimum permitted level of health coverage.
Moreover, many countries, especially the southern and eastern Member States, have suffered for decades brain drain of highly specialized workers such as doctors and scientists. Many of them look for better working conditions and social recognition in other countries, leaving their countries of origin short of specialized workforce. It would be desirable to harmonize their working conditions across Europe as well as to offer these highly trained workers equal opportunities.
In parallel, we have witnessed that the current preparedness plans, very influenza-focused, have proved inefficient for the COVID19 pandemic. We therefore need new pandemic preparedness plans, updated and adapted to the new characteristics of this and future pandemics, including solid communication strategies to avoid misinformation and fight fake news.
In the 21st century, we have seen a raise in the frequency of outbreaks of zoonotic diseases (transmitted from animals to humans), such as the SARS in 2003, H1N1 in 2009 and Ebola in 2014. This is not a coincidence. Environmental destruction due to deforestation and habitat loss; increasing contact of wild animals and humans; some cultural practices such as eating exotic wildlife; and intensive farming, which increases antibiotic dependence, are among the root causes of this raise. In order words, the current pandemic somehow expected and could have therefore been prevented. As a result, any new prevention measures put in place from now on should consider the interconnectivity of environmental health with animal and human health as well as a component for biodiversity protection.
There is currently a decrease in the number of new COVID19 cases and death toll, in part due to the confinement measures but also because doctors and medical staff are now more prepared and have more experience treating the disease. However, we are still at the beginning of this crisis and if we want to recover from it, we need to become a more resilient society, leaving no one behind and putting the environmental health at the centre of our economic growth. Our way towards deconfinement and reactivation of our economies should not translate into “business-as-usual”. We must be ready as a community for a new kind of normal.
Artículo aparecido en www.theparliamentmagazine.eu.