EFA participates in the joint meeting of the EMA Patient and Consumer Working Party (PCWP) & Health Care Professionals Working Party At the end of February EFA Board member Lina Buzermaniene attended the joint meeting of the Patient and Consumer & Health Care Professionals Working Parties organised by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) in London. This joint meeting with representatives from patients’, consumers’ and healthcare

EFA attends public hearings on the EU Tobacco Products Directive The European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) held a hearing in Brussels on the 19 February in order to allow stakeholders of the new Tobacco Products Directive to inform themselves on positions on the proposal. EFA, represented by Susanna Palkonen, was surprised that around two-thirds of those present represented the tobacco industry. However, the health NGOs presented a strong

EFA Allergy Awareness Project  Over the past month EFA has circulated letters to its partner organisations inviting them to ask their members to sign EFA’s Call to Action on respiratory allergies in Europe. EFA sincerely thanks its partners for their assistance as we have now collected just over 1,400 signatures since the website was launched a year ago. Among the signatories there are five Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) and over half

Policy Round-Up The results of the HealthVent project were presented at the European Parliament (see article above) and the European Commission was requested to issue a Green Paper on indoor air quality in conjunction with the EU Year of Air and the revision of the EU air legislation.  EFA is preparing a briefing on the Commission’s proposal for the Seventh Environmental Action Programme (7 EAP), “Living well, within the limits of our planet”.

HealthVent event at the European Parliament – Health-based ventilation guidelines for Europe On 20 February 2013 EFA organised an event in the European Parliament at which the HealthVent project consortium presented the HealthVent guidelines (see our January article). The event was hosted by MEP Catherine Stihler and attracted more than 50 participants who learnt about the project’s results and exchanged ideas in view of the final report of the

EFA President Breda Flood will speak at an Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) entitled ‘Applying open innovation to bring personalised medicine to new disease areas’. The event will take place in Dublin at the Crowne Plaza Dublin-Northwood Hotel on the afternoon of the 20th of March. The workshop is organised within the framework of a wider event on innovation and patient access to personalised medicine organised by the European Alliance for

Norwegian Asthma and Allergy Association tells of Norwegian hopes for a national allergy and asthma programme  EFA’s Norwegian member, the Norwegian Asthma and Allergy Association, has been keeping us up to up to date on plans in Norway to adopt a 10 year national asthma and allergy programme for the period 2014 – 2023. So far the Association has reported excellent collaboration between it and the Norwegian Health Authorities (Directorate of

PROactive is a European project funded by the Innovative Medicines Initiative Joint Undertaking (IMI-JU) under the auspices of the European Commission and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA). Remaining physically active is crucial for patients to maintain health and health related quality of life.  Decreased physical activity is a marker of a deteriorating health condition that is important and noticeable

EFA member Prévention des allergies is due to speak at a conference in October 2013 in Angers, France, on the subject of the difficulties encountered by children and adolescents with food allergies. The conference will aim to develop ideas for action to help this group, and will be attended by doctors and specialists from all over France, Belgium and Luxembourg. Prévention des allergies would like to hear from children and young adults on this

In order to make the Oxygen Harmonisation Project a great success, it was agreed to collect real life stories and inquiries from patients with chronic respiratory diseases who require oxygen when they travel in airplanes. The inquiries and stories are requested to assist EFA provide evidence to justify improvement in assistance for the unsolved situation regarding the harmonisation of oxygen use in European air travel. The inquiries are asked to

U-BIOPRED holds AGM On the 21st and 22nd of January 2013, the fourth annual general meeting of the U-BIOPRED project took place in Barcelona. U-BIOPRED (Unbiased BIOmarkers in PREDiction of respiratory disease outcomes) is a research project funded by the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), a public-private-partnership between the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development, FP 7, and the European

The Year of Air 2013 To kick-start a new phase of policy-making in the field of air regulation in Europe, the European Commission has declared 2013 the ‘Year of Air’, to highlight the importance of clean air for all and to focus on actions to improve air quality across the EU. It has promised new legislative proposals on improving air quality, and is already collaborating with the World Health Organisation Regional Office for Europe to analyse