In the aftermath of COVID 19 pandemic, the Health in All Policies (HiAP) approach has never been so strong in global/regional/national agendas to roll out whole-of-a-governance and whole-of-a-systems strategies in health policy governance. The European Union (EU) is also committed to safeguard the interests of ‘health in all policies’ for developing an Economy of Wellbeing. The HiAP approach is a long-standing policy measure with regards to governance decisions for the EU and its associated countries including Finland.
However, the roll out of HiAP is alarmingly slow in trade-related negotiations, agreements and arenas where commercial interests are at stake.
Our research addresses these limitations in three distinct yet interrelated steps. To overcome the regional and country-level challenges, we examine and assess the extent to which the EU has addressed health concerns in trade and investment policies relating to other countries and/or economic unions. At the global scale, we also engage with the processes of international deliberations to seek innovative measures in mitigating the influences of trade and commerce in post-pandemic negotiations for pandemic prevention-preparedness, and health systems resilience-recovery planning and action. We mix our practical experiences of national-regional-global health policy processes with public health/bio-ethics principles and frameworks to develop new tools to explicate and better balance conflicts between health and trade priorities. We welcome suggestions, interests and collaborations.
Project team
Professor Meri Koivusalo (Health Sciences Unit, Tampere University)
Professor Anita Katharina Wagner (Department of Population Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute)
Professor Abbe Brown (Professor in Intelectual Property Law, School of Law, University of Aberdeen)
Ms. Chloe Stephenson (Health Sciences Unit, Tampere University)
Dr. Amitabha Sarkar (Health Sciences Unit, Tampere University)