COVID-19 Health Certificates: Analysis of policy implementation, framings, and controversies in nine European countries

Abstract

COVID-19 Health Certificates represented a key policy in Europe during the COVID-19 pandemic and were introduced globally by the World Health Organization to strengthen pandemic preparedness. This article undertakes a comparative analysis of COVID-19 Health Certificate policies, and their underlying narratives and framings in nine European countries. Policies differed across European nations in timing, scope, and stringency of the measures entailed and were often subject to major controversies and heated public debates. By tracing their distinct policy narratives (providing emergency response, restoring social and economic activities, and incentivizing vaccination), we suggest that Certificates also served as a proxy for other, highly controversial measures (such as vaccine mandates). When this happened, they were met with intense pushbacks from citizens. Additionally, we show that scientific evidence was differently appropriated in national policy narratives, and that concerns commonly associated with novel digital health technologies (e.g. privacy) did not rise to prominence in public debates.