Everyone wants to live in the best environmental and social conditions. Health combines biopositive and bionegative factors. Public health refers to a supra-individual perspective, so the totality of factors influencing the health of an individual must be taken into account and related on a societal scale to clarify priorities for public health, as well as considering possible threats (e.g. infectious diseases or civilization diseases). Public health is an ambiguous term. Hardly achievable. EU and national legislators are working hard to ensure we have a high level of health. However, there are many factors that pose a huge challenge to the legal protection of societies. In particular, the recent COVID-19 pandemic should be borne in mind, which vividly demonstrated the gaps in legal systems and the complete unpreparedness of regulations for such an eventuality. Ad hoc lawmaking demonstrated the ineptitude of the Polish legislator, which could serve as an example for many European countries.
The main research questions are: Do current international standards allow for a high level of public health that positively affects the health of individuals?; Do national regulations effectively protect public health?
The presentation will discuss the main assumptions of public health protection and present possibilities to modify existing legal norms. It will also highlight how a misunderstanding of what health is and its precise definition affects erroneous legislative decisions. A selection of international and national law regulations will be analysed. In particular, attention will be focused on WHO and EU standards, as well as Polish public law.