 We're back. We're live here on a given Thursday at 9am here in Honolulu and Gauri Kandikar who was in Brussels and it's 9pm on a Thursday in Brussels. She stayed up a little bit and she joins us now. Welcome to the show, Gauri. Thank you so much. It's always a pleasure and an honor to be on your show. Gauri has an international awareness in the sense that she's a researcher in the academic community in Brussels and she looks at international relations and the like for many years in one capacity or another and we want to talk to her today about how things are doing in Europe over COVID because Lord knows it fills the airways here in Honolulu. It fills the airways in the United States and it's very very troubling because it's been politicized for reasons that are very hard to understand but let's take a look at Europe. Let's find out how it's been going. I know there's the surge there and the question is how serious is the surge, how are people reacting and to what extent is it politicized in Europe? So basically when you step outside on the street everything feels very very normal. It's holiday season here and you know every summer we pretend that there's no COVID it doesn't exist. So life goes back to normal what I mean. It's very funny actually but yeah at least in Belgium but in most countries as well there's no more mandate to wear the mask. That's also come about due to a lot of protests but I mean overall people have chosen to be vaccinated and it's still going on you know the vaccination rule. So around 58% of Europeans are fully vaccinated so double doors and that's the latest data from this morning. We're doing quite well in that sense and you know restaurants are open people are on holidays of course you know the numbers are going up because of the Delta variant. But still life is quite normal here it's returned to normal. How are you? Is it returned to normal for you? You have a young child you have to be a little concerned about going out. Yeah personally I'm really concerned so I try not to step out too much especially with the baby. Although most children are you know quite safe from the virus but I mean you know you hear stories there was a story about a 12 year old boy in the US who passed away due to the Delta variant unfortunately. But I still wear masks I still wash my hands and whoever comes into my home which is very little we have this term in Belgium called cuddly contacts only those were allowed to enter your home and I still keep the rule you know and they must wear masks as well around the baby especially. I have a user question for you actually I had two this is a viewer question okay first viewer question how are Europeans I suppose that's Belgium but it's other countries that you know of how are Europeans dealing with the isolation issues and have there been any studies of potentially long-term mental and psychological problems because that's happening in the US? You know there's very little done here and I think the US might be a bit better at it. It's a really good question because I'm pretty sure there are a lot of people that are suffering from isolation but also a fear of joining back the normal life you know once you've been staying in so much then you have a bit of anxiety to get out and that's not addressed here I see it on Twitter but on a European level that is really not addressed and it should be that's an excellent question actually. What about the schools are the schools open it's you know it's August, September we have to think about schools now you know are the kids in school they're going back to school is there any controversy over it as there is in the US? Not at all schools were open they shut down for the holidays in July I think my baby is still not going to school so yeah and they will open as early as possible and kids will go to school normally there's not been any controversy to that extent also because parents and sons were a bit frustrated having the kids at home and having to work while you know homeschooling them so many people are very happy for the kids to go back to school and when the kids go to school they are they wearing masks are they practicing distancing in school? No no no masks no distancing I think it's just that when somebody gets infected they have to do a test as well you know if there's a kid in school in a class who's infected the others need to do a COVID test and the COVID test now you can get them at pharmacies it's a quick rapid test done in 10 minutes. And if the kid is found to have COVID what happens? Then they quarantine for a week I think the latest is at seven days. And in the US you know young children cannot get I think it's 12 years old they cannot get the vaccine and that's supposed to be vaccine is the same thing in Europe? Yes so basically in Europe they're vaccinating adults what I've read is in the UK they've offered it to 16 17 year olds and there was a bit of backlash from parents saying that you know they would need our consent then the government does not specify that and just this morning I read that the UK has opened it up to kids as old as 12 years old. I have not seen amongst my friends any parents even contemplating you know vaccinating their kids so far but now we know that you know even with the Delta variant you can catch it even if you're vaccinated of course it won't be as serious but you know there are grandparents and kids transmit the virus they don't necessarily fall very ill that would but they would they would transmit it to at least the grandparents parents so for me that's a concern. So how bad is the surge I mean the surge in the United States which is largely political because there are some states where people as a general matter won't take the vaccine you know where it's pretty serious and the hospitals are filled up and there's no intensive care beds available and it's crisis it's emergency and it's very problematic but I wonder if that's happening in Europe. So in Europe there has been a decrease recently after more than a month of increases in cases because of the Delta variant you know and these the decrease has basically been as a result of the decline in cases from Spain and the UK so Spain had really a lot of cases high level of cases a month ago and that was really threatening a lot of people's holidays especially from the UK people love to go to Spain but now we see a bit of decrease and that is I think also going hand in hand with the increasing number of vaccinations yeah but still I mean and Spain was basically the had the highest incidence of Covid in the EU recently and it's still marked dark red by the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control meaning you know travel is discouraged to Spain but people are still going on holiday there and I think as more and more people have vaccinated it will ease up further. Yeah that raises another question that somebody has sent in a viewer has sent in how have some of the different countries been impacted by the various lockdowns and business restrictions I guess he's asking about two things you know one is the pushback that you spoke about you know people reacting but the other is what about the economy you know Europe is filled with small and medium-sized businesses mom and pop kinds of businesses they must be suffering so how is that working in Europe now? Yeah so we don't have a recession yet but overall I think economy wise it's picking back up as because the industrial sector is coming back up so what happened during the crisis was that we realized that the industrial value chains are so dependent on you know third countries and we really didn't have the capacity here to produce our own PPEs and hand gel so a lot of chemical companies for instance they converted their business to produce hand gel and other medical requirements because you know all trade foreign trade had stopped so that has also led to a rethink of how industries structured here how different that industrial value chains need to be shorter and that has happened since 2020 so the restructuring has already started and that has helped you know kickstart the economy there's also been a lot of sorry and money injected to the economy due to the from from the European Union so not only is the Green Deal which you heard of you know the big package which will help Europe become more resilient and to address climate change but also there's the COVID recovery funds which the EU is distributing to its member states and that goes to the economy but also you know it has the goal to also make various sectors of the economy or climate compatible you know so in that sense Europe is Europe has been quite prudent and it's kind of making this small taking small steps back to where it was before the pandemic started but there have been lots of protests also in France and they're currently protests from unvaccinated people in across various European states to not make vaccines mandatory because here the rules across various states now that you know you need a vaccine to go to a restaurant or to the cinema and also to travel etc so not specifically for travel but at least to go to some restaurants and people are challenging that and there are big protests around but not as big as you know they were to lift the lockdowns. Okay well that's good to hear why are they protesting I mean what motivates them is it a is it a religious thing is it a political thing is it a constitutional freedom thing what is it? No it's just anti-vaxxers I think it's a common link across you know religions cultures etc you find anti-vaxxers everywhere and anti-vaxxers don't want to get vaccinated and they don't want the government to mandate vaccine or to make you know they're like more difficult in that sense. You know one thing you mentioned that I want to I want to follow up on is is that the EU has economic program assistance programs sort of like the way the US national government under Biden has economic assistance programs and that's a national thing and in Europe it sounds like it's the EU. Now we know you and I have talked about the the migrant issue we've talked about some countries in Europe having economic problems over the recent years where you know a given country is kind of in trouble economically but now you speak about the EU doing things and it strikes me Gary on a larger level that COVID is bringing EU the EU countries closer together because these are critical steps their economic steps they involve a lot of money I assume and so now the EU is taking a larger role in managing a larger problem which exists all around Europe and and this will continue this will this will be more the case going forward am I right? Yes um so you really made excellent points there it's very true that the pandemic has brought European countries close and the reason was because prior to the pandemic well as soon as the pandemic broke down each country started having its own you know policies to deal with it and that didn't really work because we're we're an area of free movement you know free movement of people goods etc etc so that doesn't work in in an area like Schengen and then the Commission assumed European Commission assumed a bigger role also in making sure that you know national policies were compatible that that they also negotiated at the European Commission vaccine prices so it has been the European Commission that's been negotiating you know deals with the big pharma for vaccines and they've got competitive pricing so it worked in that sense now of course you know make up projects like COVID recovery are handled by the EU because it's there's a thing called proportionality which means that what works at the best level should be used you know so here we see that the European level works best that's why the EU has been coordinating efforts and distributing money to its member states what what is proportionality what is it what is it proportionate about so sorry just think I messed it up there's subsidiarity so the principle of subsidiarity it means that you know action should be taken at the level which is best pleased too so for example schools or education it can't be relegated by the European Union because you know it's a national policy because the nation state can do it best so French schools are governed by you know French state but you know when we have something like trade you see that the EU level is best placed and in the same sense to coordinate a Europe wide recovery but also you know travel policy for example who comes in into and goes out of Europe you need a bit of a higher vantage point and that's why the EU has been best placed also it negotiates better as a block so if you have a stronger position in negotiating prices because if you had all European countries negotiating individually they could have made it tougher to get a better covid price but in that sense the EU has been better placed but there's also in one other factor which has made the European Union respond stronger is that the UK is no longer a member state how does that tell me how that works so it's a good thing that the UK took off yes because the UK has always had a lot of reservations in that sense they've also been ironically the member state that has implemented EU rules and regulations and direct is the best but there's been a lot of pushback over the years from the UK and in that sense they work it works better for the EU at the moment because the other member states want a closer union well to go back for a moment of proportionality if I if I'm able to get say 500 million doses of a vaccine into the EU and negotiate a price the EU negotiates a price who determines how much goes to each individual country and and what is the distribution based on is it based on population is it based on need is it based on economics and who decides that because I think it's a very important question in terms of you know the EU stepping up and taking a role to make an equitable distribution but on what do they base you know the proportions um so funnily enough and I've written a critique of this policy is that the EU had like all other developed countries you know the US so Japan had purchased almost four times the amount of vaccines than their populations there have been plenty of vaccines and they were distributed according to population size of course you know the fight was who got the doses first but now it's it's panned out it's it's quite okay at the moment because earlier at one point we also had Hungary taking the Russian vaccine because so you know Viktor Orban is not very for you at the moment so he's always going the wrong direction so he was not very happy with the EU's dealing of the of the vaccine procurement you know there were I think we spoke about it during the last time there was there were some challenges because AstraZeneca promised vaccines but they were not delivering they were delivering more to the UK even though they had factories in Belgium so at that point you know Hungary had lost faith they bought Russian vaccines but now it's all okay at the moment there's enough vaccines with more than enough as you're free if you wanted a vaccine can you go down and get it free yes it's free European Union so no I something I don't understand gallery is that only maybe three weeks ago the prime minister of France the president of France Macron you know indicated he was going to do draconian things in order to require vaccines and masks and distancing and he got a lot of pushback about it but you know people in this country at least the people that I've but I'm on the left side of things I'm not on the obviously the right Trump side of things but we all thought that was a great idea because you know in the United States we have trouble making people take the vaccine and of course we know that if a large number of people don't get the vaccine that affects everyone else and we found that it even affects people who had the vaccine and it also leads to the increased possibility of additional variants and all that so we were happy to see Macron do that but the picture you describe is it isn't necessary how do you feel about what Macron has done has he helped France or has he just created a controversy no I didn't mean to say it's not necessary it is necessary to get from my perspective 100% vaccination you know because you know you put other people at risk but also because of the variants because the vaccines won't always maybe not be resilient to all the different variants you already have the Delta Plus in South Korea you know we're putting the entire society at risk so what Emmanuel Macron has been doing personally I really like him and I like his policies and they've been quite progressive some have been aggressive unquestionable but you know overall at least in terms of the COVID-19 pandemic he's been a strong president now what he's doing is of course like I mentioned you know vaccines to go to restaurants cinema theater and what have you but also he wanted to impose masks on the beach in France and I have friends traveling in France at the moment and they're not wearing masks there on the beach it gives you a funny suntan a funny suntan so what about what about other countries I mean other countries following his lead A I think that this is my observation is that there was a big tumult about what Macron did for a few days after he did it and then it was quiet it's quite the news and it's quiet now so my assumption is that well people people are essentially going along with it and it's not nearly as controversial and they have decided they might as well follow you know in France they might as well abide by his policies it's okay it's positive as you say he's a well respected leader for a lot of people but what about other countries have they said hmm that's a good idea we should do the same thing that Macron is doing has he demonstrated leadership within the EU he has demonstrated leadership within the EU in terms of getting various EU initiatives through you know germanium trans and one of the engines of the european union so they push forward the big ticket deals like the covid recovery fund the green deal etc etc but for the moment like I said it's holiday season there's very little going on in terms of you know restrictions etc and it's imposed less as well well you know in the old days that cons that cons everybody moved all around Europe and I wonder in the vacance this year people are moving west staying home concerned about going to other countries or limited limited by regulation to go to other countries I mean how has the cons been affected so I don't have the statistics but when you see the policies across Europe the lockdowns and restrictions started ending when it was time for vacations like last year as well so there's no difference from last year in that sense you know this year the cases are comparatively less you know there's not an emergency so last year people started going on vacations but then the country immediately became red on the european map you know covid map and then people had to go back home this year it's more relaxed because people have access a lot of people have vaccinated um it's it's quite um there's just a sense of normalcy around going on vacations all yeah well I knew already went so what what they've implemented is also until past which you know shows you if you're vaccinated if you have you have to take a test etc etc so some countries have restrictions that you know you might need to quarantine for a day or two if you're vaccinated or like 10 days if you're non-vaccinated but otherwise it's um and that's individual member state to member state level that's decided so you have to go on the internet and find out the different rules in the different countries hey indeed indeed it's been quite a bit of a hassle so everybody has had to do their own research and figure out what the individual rules are um uh before they go to another wouldn't it be better if the EU handled that on a uniform basis yes indeed but again that's subsidiary you know the the principle of subsidiary is basically member states are best place to decide what happens for their state in that sense well so um I was going to ask you what about the availability of medical care of hospitalization of you know intensive care units and all that from what you say it doesn't sound like it's a problem in some places in the US there are no beds uh is that the case in Europe not really there's not been any a dead light emergency sound that you know uh I mean Belgium has more ICU beds than um that India even so there's well equipped medical services across Europe and for the moment there's not uh as many uh deaths or hospitalization as during the height of COVID that's great that's great you've come a long way and uh you know it's not like you're behind the curve you're it sounds in many ways like you're ahead of the curve vis-à-vis um some places in the United States yeah so here's here's my I know your baby is calling for me so I only I only have one more question Gowery and that is you know when you and I have talked in the past we have often discussed the European reaction to what is happening across the water in the United States and I wonder you know how people feel about you know the um not to usually a Yiddish term but uh the churus that trouble uh that is happening in the United States and it's all linked to the political trouble isn't it so query how do people feel about that in Europe because Europe sounds like it's well able to handle these issues and they look across the water and they say hmm our poor cousins in the United States they're having trouble how do people feel about that I think there is more confidence uh at the moment big in Europe vis-à-vis the US because of the Biden administration so things seem more under control as compared to under the Trump administration and the cases were soaring you had uh so many deaths as well across the US uh I think it's each what two two million cases in the US already um yeah 600,000 600,000 deaths 200,000 across the world sorry um but that's still a high number you know but now there's more confidence because the Biden administration they are there you know it's just this kind of mental uh uh uh stability uh sorry um is uh it's a perspective issue I think although you know you mentioned there's various states that have their own crises um but here we get a pretty more stabilized picture of the US yeah and you talked about travel about how it's a kind of lockdown a border I have to use that term a border between Europe and the rest of the world you know Biden wants to require vaccinations for everybody traveling from anywhere outside the US and that's probably an okay idea my own view is that everybody should have a vaccination unless specifically um you know excused by medical authorities um but what about the EU and other countries I mean you have developing countries around the world which have a very high rate of COVID um and they're not so efficient at handling it as the EU and I wonder what what is the border situation for example the migrants coming from uh you know uh the uh the Middle East and the like uh and Central Asia uh and and for that matter India uh Russia um and so forth South America uh what is the border like is is the EU excluding people so um there's for different countries have different uh um systems these are with different countries you know um so when they come from a red zone they must take uh a negative PCR COVID tests within 72 hours and then they don't need to get tested or quarantine but it depends on travel from country to country again it's you know it's hard to give you a full picture for 28 27 different countries sorry no longer the UK but the moment is difficult for them okay I know at the moment it's difficult because somebody is calling for your attention and thank you thank you Gary for joining us it's great to see you and I'll circle back and uh you know we're going to do a similar inquiry with uh Rupmani you know your sister uh in India so I want to I want to compare the two between your experience in Europe and hers in India thank you so much Gary Kandekar friend our cars planted in Brussels aloha thank you so much thank you aloha