At first glance, there is a solid ground for singling out older people during the current pandemic as a special group: the mortality related to COVID-19 is increasing with the age and for those 80 and above years old it is five times the global average based on WHO data. About 95 per cent of those who have died from COVID-19 in Europe were over 60 years, and more than half of them were over 80 years. This tragic statistics has prompted governments to focus their anti-epidemic measures on older persons by often demanding their self-isolation for the period beyond the terms set for younger population.

The posting of workers describes a process by which companies and temporary work agencies send employees from one EU Member State to another to provide a service in that country for a specific period of time based on dedicated EU Directives. Meanwhile, posted employees remain covered by and pay contributions to the social security institutions of their home country.

Readers of this essay are invited to a quiz: try to spot the difference between reality and dystopia!

“Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you to this meeting that we are starting today with a new ritual. As you know, registration with the COVID-19 app is a prerequisite for attending this meeting. Now I ask you for the corresponding ‘electronic handshake’. At the same time, I have to inform you that you are obliged to report immediately if you receive a health warning during our session. In this case the session will be terminated.”

Research projects at the European Centre demonstrate the significance of inter-disciplinary thinking particularly in times of the worldwide Covid-19 crisis. In fact, what is currently designated as a “health crisis” expands beyond medicine and calls for expertise in several other disciplines of the scientific arena such as economics, political science, legal studies, information technology, sociology and philosophy. Hence, expertise in health economics, social welfare politics, law enforcement, technology assessment and ethics is needed to gauge the social consequences in this situation. In the following contribution, I would like to present findings from European Centre’s research together with fresh ideas to underline this inter-disciplinary approach.

Research carried out by the European Centre had already shown pervasive inequalities in access to care as well as in the coverage of health insurance and potential remedies. The Covid-19 crisis brings the evidence to the headlines of the news that social inequalities and the dismantling of health and social welfare systems are killing people. The current crisis also shows that health and social care are not a ‘product’ which can be produced low-cost and provided to those with sufficiently large incomes only.