On 1 August 2023, the US State Department introduced the launch of a brand new bureau to assist strengthen the worldwide well being safety structure.

Headed by a number one virologist, Dr John Nkengasong – with over 30 years of expertise in public well being, the Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy could be immediately underneath US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, indicating new discovered significance in the direction of well being safety.

Are different states additionally equally approaching well being safety?

And how will this securitisation influence regional groupings just like the Quad?

Global belief was at an all-time low when COVID-19 hit the world. However, it additionally highlighted the significance of worldwide well being diplomacy. It paved the best way for vaccine diplomacy whereby states that had been lagging or unable to vaccinate their populations got an opportunity to take action.

Vaccines had been supplied by many international locations, together with India, to these most in want as a consequence of inequity in entry to vaccines.

In what was seen as an unprecedented diplomatic victory, the COVID-19 vaccine was nearly declared a ‘Global Public Good‘ when World Trade Organisation (WTO) members agreed to partially waive mental property protections with a slender exception to an export restriction on COVID-19 vaccines for 5 years.

But good intentions, if not formalised, are unable to final.

Changing geo-political concerns and rising distrust pressured international locations to have interaction in well being securitisation to guard their individuals.

In their search to make sure a resilient and safe Indo-Pacific area, the Quad members started partaking in well being diplomacy early on.

The Quad Vaccine Partnership, introduced in March 2021, was yet one more multilateral effort to assist tackle the issue of vaccine inequity that grew to become stark as a result of aftereffects of  COVID-19.

In 2021 and 2022, Quad companions helped meet the area’s most urgent want and helped present over 400 million protected and efficient COVID-19 vaccine doses to Indo-Pacific international locations and nearly 800 million doses globally, bilaterally and in partnership with COVAX.

The 2023 Quad Leaders’ Summit introduced a transfer from Quad Vaccine Partnership right into a extra complete Quad Health Security Partnership, with dedicated funding to help discipline epidemiology, outbreak responder coaching, enhance illness surveillance, enhance knowledge techniques, and strengthen public well being laboratories.

Hence, at present the Quad goals to strengthen their partnership to raised coordinate and collaborate on well being safety within the Indo-Pacific.

Other state actors are additionally partaking in well being safety partnerships in their very own method.

Africa: The Africa Centre’s for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) launched a Health Security Partnership to Strengthen Disease Surveillance and Epidemic Intelligence in Africa in July 2023

Australia-Indonesia: The Australia-Indonesia Health Security Partnership (AIHSP) goals to extend nationwide well being safety in Indonesia so that ladies, males, and communities are much less in danger from rising infectious ailments, thereby contributing to Australian, regional, and world well being safety, in addition to supporting sustainable financial improvement and meals safety in Indonesia.

This improvement comes on the behest of a brand new flip of occasions in public well being, whose purview additionally contains social and cultural components.

Instability and insecurity from destabilising financial and social adjustments endangers entire communities and exacerbates their pre-existing social circumstances equivalent to poverty, mortality, and morbidity.

While states debate on the contours of well being safety, it’s critical that state actors, of their must safeguard safety pursuits, not neglect the bigger objective of guaranteeing the advantages of cooperation for public well being the place the illness is taken into account the menace and never the individual carrying it.

As the shift in the direction of securitisation of worldwide well being is happening and regional groupings such because the Quad work collectively to deal with public well being considerations, governments additionally must be conscious of guaranteeing equitable entry to healthcare inside nationwide well being techniques.

However, if international locations hold themselves aware of their bigger obligations, securitization might be able to go hand in hand with accountable habits in constructing a resilient global health structure.

With a number of distinguished illness outbreaks other than COVID-19, equivalent to Ebola, Zika, and Nipah, world well being safety is once more excessive on the worldwide agenda. Thus, the Quad Health Security Partnership is a a lot wanted preventive step in the proper route.

As a rustic, India has a lot to supply by way of strengthening well being safety, particularly for different members of the Global South.

New Delhi’s power lies in numbers, and this was made amply evident in the course of the pandemic when India launched the world’s largest vaccination drive in January 2021 utilizing the indigenously developed digital platform CoWIN. It entailed:

• Capacity constructing together with communication and coordination among the many group well being employees

• Tailored vaccine distribution primarily based on real-time monitoring of demand & provide

• Developed and improved manufacturing capacities of PPE kits

• And, provided vaccines to over 150 international locations underneath Vaccine Maitri.

With the Quad Health Security Partnership, India would have the ability to do much more in helping different Global South international locations.

This will assist preserve and strengthen a free and open worldwide order, bringing the advantages of public health collaboration for the bigger Indo-Pacific area.

One occasion of this could possibly be fostering regional One Health collaboration in capacity-building and trade of information and technical know-how. This is simply one of many methods through which the Quad can lead by instance. 

WHO DG, Dr. Tedros has acknowledged, “No one is safe unless we are all safe” a number of instances. But this shouldn’t be seen merely as a slogan, as dismissing or ignoring it could restrict our existence and futures.

(Dr Kanica Rakhra is an Assistant Professor at Kautilya School of Public Policy the place she teaches world affairs in public well being. Dr Smritima Diksha Lama is a Consultant primarily engaged with the Health Working Group, G20 Secretariat, Ministry of External Affairs. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed are the writer’s personal. The Quint neither endorses neither is answerable for them.)