Building a resilient European Health Union: From European interests to mutually beneficial partnerships

The European Union (EU) has launched the European Health Union to strengthen the global health architecture and health systems in its member states and worldwide. These efforts are, however, highly constrained by critical dependencies on external inputs, most prominently medical products and financial contributions to the global health architecture. The EU must overcome these dependencies through mutually beneficial partnerships with countries facing similar challenges. Europe’s ability to forge these partnerships will depend on overcoming the “donor-recipient” mindset, enabling local value creation and creating multilateral structures that also serve new allies. France and Germany can become important drivers in making a new offer to potential partners to jointly diversify supply chains and finance the global health architecture. The honest starting point is a unified European and, in particular, a unified Franco-German voice.