In an exclusive Euronews-commissioned poll, Europeans in 18 countries were asked about their opinions on key issues ahead of the EU elections in June.
ADVERTISEMENTAround 40 per cent of Europeans said they held a positive view of the EU’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to an exclusive Euronews-Ipsos poll.
But there were large differences across EU countries, ranging from 74 per cent in Portugal holding a positive view of the bloc’s impact on fighting the pandemic to a mere 24 per cent holding that view in the Czech Republic.
Respondents with the most negative views of the EU’s role during the pandemic were in Romania, Slovakia, and Austria.
Overall, around 32 per cent of Europeans polled said they had neither a positive nor negative view while 28 per cent had a negative view.
The Ipsos poll commissioned by Euronews was conducted in 18 countries online and by phone between February 23 and March 5, around three months before the June European elections.
It included a total of nearly 26,000 participants who were of voting age.
Respondents were asked if they thought that over the years the EU had a positive, negative, or neither positive nor negative impact on the “fight against the COVID-19 epidemic”.
Who was more likely to positively view the EU’s response to COVID?
In Portugal, Finland, Spain, Belgium, and Denmark, more than half of respondents held a mostly positive view of the EU’s impact on the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Overall, while there weren’t large differences in the views held by men and women, there were differences based on age.
Around 47 per cent of respondents aged 65 and older held a positive view of the EU’s handling of the pandemic, compared to 41 per cent of those aged 18 to 29 and 36 per cent of those aged 30 to 49.
While people aged 65 and older were more at risk of severe COVID-19, younger individuals may have been more adversely impacted by individual countries’ restrictions on movement.
More than half of the respondents who intended to vote for parties in the Green, Social Democratic, and pro-EU Renew groups were positive about the bloc’s efforts during COVID-19 as well.
In Greece, Italy, Sweden, Bulgaria, Germany, France, Poland, and the Netherlands, Europeans surveyed had a more positive than negative view of the EU’s impact on the fight against COVID-19.
The EU mobilised a massive €800 billion stimulus package amid the pandemic, partly based on joint borrowing, to help economies bounce back from the crisis.
They also jointly procured vaccines against the virus, securing up to 4.6 billion vaccine doses worth some €71 billion by the end of 2021, according to a report by the European Court of Auditors.
While the vaccine rollout was initially criticised as slower than those in the US and UK, the auditors' report found that the European Commission had “limited leverage to overcome supply challenges”.
The bloc ended up hitting its target of vaccinating 70 per cent of adults against COVID-19 in July 2021. Portugal, where respondents had the highest positive view of the EU’s impact on the pandemic, notably had the world’s highest vaccination rate by the end of that year.
Who was more likely to hold a negative view of the EU’s impact on COVID?
The poll found that Europeans in five countries had a more negative than positive view of the EU’s handling of the pandemic.
ADVERTISEMENTBut in all countries, the percentage of respondents who held a negative view was fewer than half of those surveyed.
Some 42 per cent of respondents in Romania saw the EU’s impact as negative, while 41 per cent of people in Slovakia held a negative view as well as 40 per cent of respondents in Austria.
Around 38 per cent of people in Hungary held a negative view of the EU’s impact on the fight against COVID-19 while 36 per cent of people in the Czech Republic did.
The Euronews-Ipsos poll also found that those who intend to vote for right-wing populist and eurosceptic parties in the Identity and Democracy (ID) group in the European Parliament held a more negative view of the EU’s response to the pandemic.
Some 49 per cent of those surveyed who intend to vote for ID parties held a negative view compared to just 22 per cent of those voting for ID parties who hold a positive view of the bloc’s impact on the pandemic.
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