COVID-19 and State liability in Portugal

Contexts of public need are realities that cannot be neglected, as demonstrated by the pandemic crisis caused by COVID-19, and are prone to cause damage. Thus, it becomes necessary to verify to what extent public entities in contexts of exceptionality are subject to a duty to compensate. To this end, this article analyses the main Portuguese legal regimes available to individuals who suffer damages in exceptional circumstances, with particular emphasis on the duty to compensate public bodies in the context of the health crisis caused by COVID-19. Thus, we start from the premise that the rule of law principle is maintained (and even to a certain extent is reinforced) in factual exceptionality scenarios, with a legal-public performance adjusted to this new reality. This being so, the State's duty to compensate for the damages caused, namely in the management of the crisis caused by COVID-19, is not suspended or restricted, which implies that one must consider which regime or regimes are more appropriate to repair or compensate the damages thatthe injured individuals should not bear, under penalty of denying one of the essential principles of the rule of law.