A historic result was recorded this month in Australia when its top court rejected a bid by some of the world’s largest tobacco companies to overturn a law requiring cigarettes to be sold in plain packaging. The plain packaging law, which was introduced in Australia last year, requires cigarettes to be sold in dark packages free from logos and colour, but featuring graphic images of smoking related diseases. Brand names can appear, but only in

This month EFA is preparing to co-host a patient symposium at the ERS Congress in Vienna, there is news on our presentation at a Food Allergy Training Course organised by EAACI, on a meeting of the Global Alliance of Respiratory Diseases in St. Petersburg and on an EU project to assess the harmful and often allergenic effects of ragweed in Europe. EFA also reports from various international meetings we have been attending and speaking attending  

EFA is preparing to co-host a symposium on ‘Patient views on respiratory allergies’ at the annual European Respiratory Society Congress in Vienna on the 4th of September this year. The symposium, subtitled ‘Raise awareness, release the burden’, will be co-hosted with the European Lung Foundation (ELF), and EFA board member Per-Ake Wecksell of the Swedish Asthma and Allergy Association will co-chair the event.   During the symposium,

EFA is pleased to invite you to the upcoming event “May Contain/Contains – Food Allergen Labelling” to be held at the European Parliament on the 19th of September 2012 from 18:00 to 20:30, kindly hosted by MEP Renate Sommer. This follows the adoption of the new EU Regulation on the provision of food information to consumers by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union last year. EFA broadly welcomed the Regulation as a

The countries where smoking is entirely banned in public and workplaces and transport – including also pubs and bars are Ireland and UK and Bulgaria is to follow in June 2010. Italy, Sweden, Malta, Latvia, Finland, Slovenia, France and the Netherlands have opted legislation allowing special enclosed smoking rooms. This makes 10 countries with comprehensive protection. 1 in five Europeans are still exposed to second hand smoke on daily basis, and

The European Medicines Agency has adopted a revised policy on the handling of conflicts of interests of Scientific Committee members and experts. Depending on the level of conflict of interest, restricted involvement in the Agency’s activities may be applied. The new policy will be further discussed at the meeting of the EMA Patient and Consumer Working Party (PCWP). We would like to draw you attention to the fact that public consultation on the

U-BIOPRED, a research project in which EFA is taking part that aims to understand more about severe asthma, is launching an art competition to help bridge the gap between patients’ and doctors’ perceptions of asthma and raise awareness of the disease. The competition is open to anyone who wishes to enter, and who would like to express their experience of living with asthma through art. Entries are welcome until the 1st of May 2011, and will be

The Italian COPD Patients' Association has recently approved its event and activity programme for 2011. One of the association's main objectives will be to have the Italian Health Ministry's "Essential Levels of Care" officially revised to include COPD as a chronic disabling disease, and various activities and joint actions are planned to help bring this about. Another annual objective is to foster and improve knowledge and research on COPD by participating

Executive Officer Susanna Palkonen took part in Philips Active Ageing THINK TANK on behalf of the European Patients’ Forum (EPF) onMay 9 in Washington. She took part in the first dialogue meeting between Eucomed, representing medical technology companies and patient organisations on May 26 in Brussels. She also took part in a working meeting of the HealthVent project, looking at the best scientific evidence linking ventilation and health in Ispra,

EFA is pleased to announce that this year's AGM and annual Network Meeting will be held in Dublin on the 11th and 12th of May, and hosted by the Asthma Society of Ireland. On the first day EFA members will have the opportunity to give input about EFA policies and activities to better serve the interests of people with allergy, asthma and COPD and improve services for members. They will also be able to vote on key issues. At this year's AGM members

On the 28th of February, EFA attended one of the periodical joint meetings of the PCWP and the Healthcare Professionals’ Working Group (HCP WG) at the EMA in London. EFA, which has been taking part in these meetings since March 2010, together with 14 other patient and consumer representative organisations, was represented by Lina Buzermaniene, EFA’s regular representative, and Roberta Savli. During the meeting, several questions arose for which

The European Commission has released a memo (MEMO/06/208) outlining in the form of Frequently Asked Questions the proposals for modernisation of the Television without Frontiers Directive 1989/52/EEC, which was published in 1989, and which bans tobacco advertising from televisions across the European Union. This comes as the results of a resolution adopted on 4 September 2003, in which the European Parliament called for a complete overhaul of this