A virus unites the world while national border closures divide it: Epidemiologic, legal, and political analysis on border closures during COVID-19
| Author | Steven J. Hoffman,Isaac Weldon,Roojin Habibi |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/00207020221135323 |
| Published date | 01 June 2022 |
| Date | 01 June 2022 |
| Subject Matter | Scholarly Essay |
Scholarly Essay
International Journal
2022, Vol. 77(2) 188–215
© The Author(s) 2022
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/00207020221135323
journals.sagepub.com/home/ijx
A virus unites the world while
national border closures divide
it: Epidemiologic, legal, and
political analysis on border
closures during COVID-19
Steven J. Hoffman, Isaac Weldonand Roojin Habibi
York University, Toronto, ON, Canada
Abstract
This article critically examines the use of national border closures at the outset of the
COVID-19 pandemic. After explaining why targeted border closures generally do not
work and howthey violated internationallaw at the time, we examine the unprecedented
case of total borderclosures. Positing that since the current instruments and institutions
of global health governance did not anticipate this phenomenon, the legality of total
border closures rests on less certain grounds. Then, after asking why nearly every
government implemented some form of border closure in March 2020 if neither science
nor law provided adequate motivation for their use, we conclude that in the face of a
global health emergency, border closures represent an opportunity for political leaders
to show determined action, redirect blame to other jurisdictions, and reinforce na-
tionalism. We proceed to argue that both targeted and total border closures have
profound legal,epidemiological, and politicalsignificance as performancesthat contradict
global realitieswhile undermining notionsof global solidarity. Such politicaltheatre means
that citizens must weigh these consequences against any perceived benefits of border
closures as they would any other politically driven government action, and contest and
challenge them appropriately. Citizens mustnot unduly defer to scientists or lawyers on
early COVID-19 border closures because these were primarily political—not scientific
or legal—decisions. In this vein, we conclude with some guiding political considerations
for scrutinizinggovernment decisions to closeborders and observations for the futureof
global health cooperation during infectious disease outbreaks.
Corresponding author:
Steven J. Hoffman, Global Strategy Lab, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Email: Steven.hoffman@globalstrategylab.org
Keywords
International law, international health regulations, COVID-19, pandemic, global heal th,
infectious disease, international relations, travel bans
With infectious disease outbreaks come pressure on national governments to restrict
international travel from affected countries. Many governments give way to this
pressure, even when such measures are not rooted in public health guidance or
scientific evidence. Controls on international travel from high-risk regions, im-
plemented by dozens of countries within the first 2 months of the COVID-19
outbreak (see Figure 1) and after the discoveries of its variants of concern, isolated
vulnerable communities, devastated fragile economies, and disincentivized affected
governments from reporting new cases of disease.
1
Such measures, referred to in this
paper as “targeted border closures”(see Tab le 1 ),arealsoconsideredinmanyin-
stances to be infringements of the International Health Regulations (IHR)—the
legally binding instrument administered by the World Health Organization (WHO)
that governs how nearly all the world’s countries respond to public health emer-
gencies of international concern (PHEIC) like COVID-19.
2
In turn, targeted border
closures undermine our system of cooperation on global public health and the rules-
based world order on which we depend
3
(Figure 2).
This article critically examines the use of targeted borde r closures and, to a lesser
extent, the unprecedented case of total border closures at the outset of the novel coro-
navirus (now SARS-CoV-2) outbreak. In the first part of the artic le, we challenge the
narrative that border closures deployed at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic were
justifiableby science and law. Weargue that borderclosures at the onsetof the COVID-19
pandemic were adopted for chiefly political reasons and, in some cases, were exploited to
advance other political gains. In the s econd part of the article, we evaluate th e epide-
miological, legal, and political consequences of border closures and discuss how new
developments in our understanding of border closures may affect the future of global
health cooperation. Specifically, in the context of a prevailing global tension between
integration and fragmentation, weargue that it is not necessary that borders always remain
open in the face of an emerging infectious disease ou tbreak; however, it remains vitally
importantthat global cooperation is sustained. Anyattempt to embrace coordinated border
1. Roojin Habibi et al., “The Stellenbosch consensus on legal national responses to public health risks:
Clarifying Article 43 of the International Health Regulations,”International Organizations Law Review,
2 December 2020, 1–68.
2. Ibid.
3. Roojin Habibi et al., “Do not violate the International Health Regulations during the COVID-19 outbreak,”
The Lancet (British edition) 395, no. 10225 (2020): 664–666; Steven J. Hoffman and Roojin Habibi,
“Opinion: Canada should not join other countries in instituting travel restrictions –or in breaking in-
ternational law,”The Globe and Mail, 13 February 2020, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/
article-canada-should-not-join-other-countries-in-instituting-travel/ (accessed 26 September 2022).
Hoffman et al. 189
To continue reading
Request your trial