Euro Brief
December 2006. No: 12/2006
For further information on any of these news items, please contact: nwhile@bma.org.uk
Consultation: Implementation of EU Health Strategy
Green Paper on labour law and working time
Council of Ministers meeting – political conclusions
Access to medicines in developing countries
Priorities of the German EU Presidency
REACH – chemicals legislation
Financing sustainable health care in Europe
Consultation: Implementation of EU Health Strategy
Following on from the 2004 consultation on 'Enabling good health for all' the European Commission now wants to hear views on how to implement the future EU health strategy. The strategy will form an umbrella for all of the EU’s health-related work for the next 10 years.
The strategy will be in place from 2007 to 2017 and will be adopted in June 2007. It will have three priorities:
- Core issues (health promotion, inequalities, patient mobility, ageing etc.)
- Health in all policies (environment, regional development etc.)
- Global health (communicable diseases, pandemic, trade, development, aid)
Green Paper on labour law and working time
The European Commission has published a Green Paper on labour law as part of the Lisbon Strategy to encourage competitiveness and growth. The paper focuses on ‘flexicurity’ which encompasses the idea of having a flexible workforce while maintaining job security (i.e. a mixture of the UK and French labour systems). The Commission aims to publish a concrete policy proposal in June 2007 following on from this consultation.
One of the questions in the paper asks for ideas and comments on the European Working Time Directive. This question was apparently inserted by the Commission at the last minute following the stalemate between Member States in November (see Eurobrief 11/06). Through this question the Commission wants to gather the opinions of stakeholders as to what possible solution exists for breaking the stalemate on the Directive. The consultation ends on 31 March 2007 and the BMA intends to submit a response.
Council of Ministers meeting - political conclusions
At this month’s meeting of EU health and social affairs ministers, a number of agenda items were discussed of interest to the health sector.
Ministers reached political agreement on the new Public Health funding programme which will run from 2007 to 2013 and which will have a total budget of €324,15 million. The European Parliament will now have to approve the proposal before the programme can start. Ministers also agreed a Council resolution underlining the importance of health in all policies, particularly health determinants, health inequalities and health at work.
In addition, the Council adopted a set of political conclusions regarding the recently published EU Alcohol Strategy. Interestingly, the conclusions called for the European Commission, “to ensure balanced representation for the various stakeholders including the public health community, non-governmental organisations and the alcoholic beverages production, retailing and hospitality sectors, when setting up the Alcohol and Health Forum envisaged in the Communication”. This is a view that the BMA supports.
Finally, on International Health Regulations, Ministers emphasised the need for, “full and timely implementation of the IHR, and the voluntary early implementation of the IHR provisions relevant to the risk posed by avian and pandemic influenza”.
Access to medicines in developing countries
The European Parliament has adopted a report in response to the European Commission's draft regulation on compulsory licensing for the export of generic medicines to developing countries. The report encourages governments to use all the possibilities available to them under the TRIPs Agreement, such as compulsory licences, and for the WHO and the WTO to review the whole of the TRIPs Agreement with a view to improving access to medicines. MEPs also want the TRIPS agreement to be modified, particularly in order to abolish the complex, time-consuming procedural steps needed for authorisation of compulsory licenses.
On a related note, MEPs have also called on the Commission to increase to €1 billion its contribution to the global fund against HIV/AIDS, malaria and TB, and on all Member States and G8 members to increase their contribution to €7 billion in 2007 and €8 billion in 2008, in order to provide UNAIDS with the resources necessary to reduce the epidemics.
Priorities of the German EU Presidency
Germany will assume the rotating six-month Presidency of the EU as from 1 January 2007 and has stated that it will give a relatively low profile to health matters. Its overall health priority will be HIV/AIDS however it also expects to examine a number of other issues. Pharmaceutical innovation in particular will be at the centre of the German EU policy. The Presidency will be pushing for a proposal for a Regulation on Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products (individualised therapies or pharmacogenomics). An expert meeting is scheduled for early 2007 which will address scientific as well as regulatory aspects of these new therapeutical approaches.
Further, the review of the Medical Devices Directive is also high on the agenda. It seems that an agreement on the main issues is foreseeable for the end of the year after the Directive was approved by the relevant parliamentary committee in October.
The Portuguese will take over the Presidency from 1 July and are likely to focus their attentions on health and migration.
REACH – chemicals legislation
European Ministers and MEPs have finally found agreement on the controversial REACH Directive which will ensure that some 30,000 chemicals currently used in everyday products undergo at least basic health and safety testing. Coming after three years of negotiation, the compromise agreement has angered members of the Green Party who believe that it does not go far enough.
Financing sustainable health care in Europe
A report on ‘Financing Sustainable Health Care in Europe’ is currently being drafted by a number of European stakeholders. The aim is to present specific recommendations for Member States and the EU to boost healthcare productivity and efficiency. The initial recommendations of the report were presented on 7 December 2006, and include:
Increased competition in health care provision leading to results-oriented healthcare and increased accountability
'Incentivising' consumers to consume wisely and suppliers to produce efficiently
Empowering patients through increased access to health information
Rewarding innovation and reforming health-technology assessment (HTA) to improve the relative effectiveness of health care (balancing innovation, medical progress and productivity gains with health-care budgets)
The full report, detailing these four initial recommendations will be published in a conference on ‘Sustainable healthcare financing: new approaches for new outcomes’ in Helsinki in February 2007.