The Law of Global Health Emergencies

 The Law of Global Health Emergencies - By Desi Ward

Are You Aware of The Laws About Your Health?

Internationally, some laws regulate and advise our health as a global society. Are you aware of those laws? These laws can be harmful, degrading, and even cause world oppression. Although there is a supposed framework that constructs international global health emergencies, the International Health Regulations (IHR), apparent gaps appear in global cooperation and the institutions overseeing them. The International Health Regulations (IHR) are a “governing framework for global health security for the past decade” (Gostin & Katz, 2016).

The origin of IHR can be traced to a series of Sanitary Conferences beginning in 1851. The Sanitary Conferences led to a binding agreement in 1892—The International Sanitary Convention (ISC). The ISC primarily focused on cholera, yellow fever, and plague, but some of the early treaties emerged from a perceived security imperative for powerful countries. This has resulted in what our agreement is today.

The International Health Regulations (IHR) are an instruments on internatial law that is legally-binding on 196 countries to build the capability to detect and report potential public health emergencies worldwide. An example of a situation like this would be COVID-19. COVID-19 (coronavirus disease) first gained widespread attention in 2019.

There are numerous reasons as to why people believe how COVID-19 was originally spread, but the most common hypotheses were either that the virus was transmitted to humans by animals or by a laboratory leak. This disease, however, spread incredibly fast and ultimately caused the death of over 1.2 million people in June of 2024. The result of this disease was millions of people losing their family members, tens of millions of people falling into extreme poverty, and millions of people dying. COVID-19 will go down in history as one of the greatest tragedies to evoke a great sense of fear in people nationwide and to rapidly become a cause of death for millions of people.

The correlation between COVID-19 and the International Health Regulations was connected to amendments that were “introduced to the establishment of National IHR Authorities by governments to coordinate IHR implementation, and include provisions to strengthen access to medical products and financing based on equity and solidarity. These changes were driven by lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic” (Amended International Health Regulations 2025).

In conclusion, there are international laws that have been constructed to be validated for the best use of individuals. These laws have been evaluated since numerous exposures to deafening diseases, such as COVID-19. COVID-19 is one of many diseases and illnesses to kill off millions of people in the world, but the exposure to these diseases has allowed the community that helps regulate the IHR to improve the laws between all 196 countries.

These laws are here to help save, keep, and regulate our health as a society. They are here to protect our health as citizens. There have been obvious gaps presented in these laws, but the more open individuals are to changing and evolving, the better these rules will become.