How can the mechanisms set up by the EU and international organisations prepare us for the next crisis? Join us for this debate.

18 months after the declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic, the European Union has already achieved the goal of vaccinating 70% of its population against the virus, thanks, partly, to centralized vaccine purchasing by the European Commission. However, the fight against COVID-19 does not end here: the EU, as highlighted in its EU Vaccine Strategy, aims to ensure timely access to vaccines for Member States and their citizens, while leading the global solidarity efforts to vaccinate in less privileged countries.

Today, the least developed countries have difficulties in accessing vaccines, there are large disparities in vaccination rates between Member States, the possibility of a booster dose requires a larger vaccine supply, and there is talk of COVID-19 becoming the new flu. However, the greatest challenge facing Europe, and the rest of the world, is to prepare for future health emergencies.

For all these reasons, it is relevant to provide a forum for discussion between authorities and health policy makers to debate the questions that COVID-19 still raises. The objective of this session is to organize a debate between stakeholders and policy makers to try to provide answers to some of these questions. The session will follow the format of a round table around the key questions of European coordinated responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and the role of the European Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority (HERA) in preventing and anticipating similar situations in the future. The recent example of the COVAX mechanism can be used as a best practice case of how Europe can help the rest of the world, and how the pooling and sharing of vaccines can be replicated in the prevention and preparedness for health emergencies.