190.
Gabriel Gregory, Lin Zhu, etc.,
Learning from the pandemic: mortality trends and seasonality of deaths in Australia in 2020, 2022.03.15,
https://academic.oup.com/ije/advance-article/doi/10.1093/ije/dyac032/6547421?searchresult=1 .
This article aim to assess whether the observed numbers and seasonality of deaths in Australia during 2020 differed from expected trends based on 2015–19 data. The conclusion is that the observed reductions in respiratory and dementia deaths and the reduced seasonality in ischaemic heart disease deaths may reflect reductions in circulating respiratory (non-SARS-CoV-2) pathogens resulting from the public health measures taken in 2020. The observed increase in diabetes deaths is unexplained and merits further study.
189.
Jonathan Pugh, Dominic Wilkinson, etc.,
Vaccine suspension, risk, and precaution in a pandemic, 2022.03.16,,
https://academic.oup.com/jlb/article/9/1/lsab036/6549442?searchresult=1 .
In early 2021, cases of rare adverse events were observed in individuals who had received the Astra Zeneca COVID-19 vaccine. Countries around the world differed radically in their policy responses to these observations. In this paper, we outline the ethical justification for different policy approaches for managing the emerging risks of novel vaccines in a pandemic. We begin by detailing the precautionary approach that some countries adopted, and distinguishing ethical questions regarding the management of known and unknown risks. We go on to outline the harms of adopting a highly precautionary approach in a pandemic context, and explain why an appropriate policy approach should accommodate the benefits as well as the risks of vaccination. In the final section, we outline three policy approaches that can accommodate the different benefits of vaccination, whilst taking into account the harms of precaution. Whilst we do not set out to defend one particular policy approach, we explain how different moral theories lend different degrees of support to each of these different approaches. Our analysis elucidates how fundamental value conflicts in public health ethics played out on the global stage of vaccine policy.
188.
Bishoy Louis Zaki, Francesco Nicoli, etc.,
Contagious inequality: economic disparities and excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic, 2022.03.17,
https://academic.oup.com/policyandsociety/advance-article/doi/10.1093/polsoc/puac011/6550136?searchresult=1 .
The COVID-19 pandemic has emphasized the need to consider multiple and often novel perspectives on contemporary policymaking in the context of technically complex, ambiguous, and large-scale crises. In this article, we focus on exploring a territory that remains relatively unchartered on a large scale, namely the relationship between economic inequalities and excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic, using a dataset of 25 European countries spanning 300 regions. Our findings reveal two pathways by which economic asymmetries and inequalities can observably influence excess mortality: labor market structures and income inequalities. We leverage our findings to offer recommendations for policymakers toward a more deliberate consideration of the multidimensionality of technically complex, large-scale crises with a high degree of societal embeddedness. These findings also urge future scholarship to utilize a range of parameters and indicators for better understanding the relationship between cues and outcomes in such complex settings.
187.
Dong Jin Kim, Andrew Ikhyun Kim,
Global health diplomacy and North Korea in the COVID-19 era, 2022.03.21,
https://academic.oup.com/ia/advance-article/doi/10.1093/ia/iiac048/6550824?searchresult=1 .
This article presents global health diplomacy as a conceptual framework that could overcome the dichotomy of humanitarianism and international politics, using health aid to North Korea during COVID-19 as a case-study. Health is a critical component of human dignity and can be a normative motivation for cooperation beyond sovereign borders. However, health is also an important element of national interest and can be a strategic motivation for transnational cooperation. The overlap between the moral and rational spaces in global health diplomacy demonstrates how COVID-19 assistance to North Korea's vulnerable population is in the enlightened self-interest of donors to prevent resurgences of new COVID-19 variants. Moreover, this framework imbues all parties, including aid recipients such as North Korea, with the global cooperative responsibility to address health. In this sense, global health diplomacy can reframe the tensions between humanitarianism and politics, morality and rationality, and cosmopolitanism and nationalism, from antithetical to complementary.
186.
Berdien B E van der Donk,
Should Critique on Governmental Policy Regarding Covid-19 Be Tolerated on Online Platforms? An Analysis of Recent Case-Law in the Netherlands, 2022.02.15,
https://academic.oup.com/jhrp/article/13/2/426/6528517 .
This policy and practice note describes and discusses two recent decisions by the District Court in Amsterdam regarding the applicability of YouTube’s and Facebook’s Community Guidelines on Covid-19 misinformation. The decisions illustrate the tense intersection between, on the one hand, the freedom to express criticism of the government’s policy for fighting the outbreak of Covid-19 in the Netherlands, and on the other hand, the prevention of (dis)information with the potential to harm public health. Analyzing the divergence in these two decisions’ argumentation will show that its roots can be traced back to a different valuation of the role of the online platforms regarding the dissemination of speech. A debate on this divergence is needed to prevent inconsistency in future decisions and to contribute to the broader discussion on content regulation in the European Union.
185.
Thiago Guimarães Moraes, etc.,
COVID-19 pandemic: anonymisation as a technical solution for transparency, privacy, and data protection, 2021.04.22,
https://academic.oup.com/idpl/article/11/1/32/6246144?searchresult=1 .
The article intends to answer the question: which technical approach could be implemented to publish transparent data on COVID-19 infections while respecting the privacy of individuals?Privacy by Design is brought as a key concept to harmonization between these topics. It is possible to conclude that while transparency databases are essential when facing a pandemic outbreak, they must respect the rights to privacy and data protection.The article presents anonymization as a set of four strategies which aims to provide unlinkability to a given dataset: (i) to minimize, (ii) to separate, (iii) to abstract, and (iv) to obfuscate.While anonymization is a technical solution that may help to bring balance between open data transparency and privacy, it needs to be complemented by organizational measures, such as access control, privacy policies, and data protection impact assessments.
184.
Prabhash Ranjan,
Compulsory licences and ISDS in Covid-19 times: relevance of the new Indian investment treaty practice, 2021.06.14,
https://academic.oup.com/jiplp/article/16/7/748/6298450?searchresult=1 .
Foreign investors are increasingly making use of investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS) to enforce their intellectual property rights.In this contextand taking into account the significance of compulsory licences (CLs) as a regulatory tool to fight the Covid-19 pandemic, this article studies India's new investment treaty practice on the issuance of CLs. It also finds that India’s new investment treaty practice elucidates how India can issue CLs without worrying about investor-state dispute settlement claims.
183.
Sufian Jusoh,Intan Murnira Ramli,
The COVID-19 Pandemic, Regional Cooperation Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Rise of Investment Facilitation, 2021.07.27,
https://academic.oup.com/chinesejil/advance-article/doi/10.1093/chinesejil/jmab013/6328853?searchresult=1 .
This assertion holds that, during and post-COVID-19 pandemic, international investment policies as reflected in the domestic policies and international investment agreements (IIAs) require a bigger role of States in the investment scene, especially in facilitating both domestic and foreign investment through a more structured and effective investment facilitation. Countries around the world need to facilitate new investments especially in the medical related products and services; and to facilitate the implementation of approved investments. Investment facilitation is also important to ensure business continuity, especially those highly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic including logistics and air services. These two sectors of service are keys to ensuring safe and efficient cross-border movement of goods including medical products and food items.
182.
Laura Bradford,Mateo Aboy,Kathleen Liddell,
COVID-19 contact tracing apps: a stress test for privacy, the GDPR, and data protection regimes, 2020.05.28,
https://academic.oup.com/jlb/article/7/1/lsaa034/5848138?searchresult=1 .
Digital surveillance has played a key role in containing the COVID-19 outbreak in China, Singapore, Israel, and South Korea. Google and Apple recently announced the intention to build interfaces to allow Bluetooth contact tracking using Android and iPhone devices. This articlelooks at the compatibility of the proposed Apple/Google Bluetooth exposure notification system with Western privacy and data protection regimes and principles, including the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Somewhat counter-intuitively, the GDPR’s expansive scope is not a hindrance, but rather an advantage in conditions of uncertainty such as a pandemic. Its principle-based approach offers a functional blueprint for system design that is compatible with fundamental rights. By contrast, narrower, sector-specific rules such as the US Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), and even the new California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), leave gaps that may prove difficult to bridge in the middle of an emergency.
181.
Dimitrios Katsikis,
‘Necessity’ due to COVID-19 as a Defence to International Investment Claims, 2021.10.08,
https://academic.oup.com/icsidreview/advance-article/doi/10.1093/icsidreview/siab009/6384691?searchresult=1 .
This article examines whether, when faced with such claims, host States will be able to resort to the doctrine of necessity under customary international law to defend the measures that they have taken. In doing so, it draws on the application of the doctrine of necessity in international investment arbitration so far, including its application to disputes arising out of the Argentine financial crisis. The article proposes a more analytical approach to the doctrine of necessity in customary international law, which will be vital if the doctrine is to remain relevant as a measure of last resort to which States can turn when faced with a crisis.
Chinese Society of International Law, in association with Chinese Institute of International Law at China Foreign Affairs University, and National Center for Foreign-related Rule of Law Research at China Foreign Affairs University
Contact: secretary@bigghgg.cn