Biosocial vulnerabilities amidst the pandemic: Instrumentalizing social life for biological control in Denmark's COVID-19 response

Jens Seeberg, Andreas Roepstorff and Mette Terp Høybye

Social Science & Medicine, 2025, vol. 378, issue C

Abstract: We argue that epidemic control during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic was based on a separation of biological and social dynamics and that the social domain was instrumentalised and reduced to a tool for biological containment. This had unintended harmful consequences for mental health and social well-being that went unaddressed because they were seen as a ‘necessary cost’. We use ethnographic material collected during the epidemic in Denmark as case material to explore the consequences of this for four groups, namely people with chronic lung disease, users of mental health services, young people and ethnic minority Danes. We explore the multidimensional vulnerabilities and agency created at the space between the biological and the social, and argue that a biosocial approach to understanding and controlling epidemics could help prevent some of these unintended negative health outcomes. We suggest that a biosocial approach to epidemic events would allow for the inclusion of vulnerable groups in processes that can inform policy-making.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2025.117907

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