The mission of The Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) has as mission “to support sustainable democracy worldwide. [It does so]…by producing and sharing comparative knowledge on the different aspects of democracy and by acting as a facilitator for the exchange of ideas and experiences on democracy.” IDEA has released a document discussing health and safety in polling stations during the COVID-19 pandemic. The document is authored by Erik Asplund, Lars Heuver, Fakiha Ahmed, Bor Stevense, Sulemana Umar, Toby James and Alistair Clark. The crucial questions are highlighted by its excerpt:

At the start of the pandemic, many countries postponed elections. From June 2020, the trend shifted to holding elections. Thanks to information sharing and peer-to-peer exchanges, election authorities gained an understanding of the risks and prevention/mitigation measures. To date, more than 100 countries and territories have held national or subnational elections that were either on schedule or initially postponed with health and safety measures. But what measures have been introduced so far? What measures have been adopted by countries that have held elections? Are the measures respected by stakeholders? Was voting safe?

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