By Giedre Peseckyte | EURACTIV.com
04-10-2022 (updated: 10-10-2022 )
EP Plenary session - Joint Debate - European Health Union. [Philippe BUISSIN/EP]
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European lawmakers rubber-stamped both the extension of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) mandate and a new law on serious cross-border threats to health on Tuesday (4 October).
The two new legislations are intended to enhance EU preparedness and response to a health crisis.
They are both parts of the ambitious plan known as the European Health Union, which was presented back in November 2020 to draw on lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The package included the launch of the Health Emergency and Response Authority (HERA) and the adoption of a stronger role for the European Medicines Agency (EMA).
“Both [legislations] fit neatly together with the other important pieces of legislation for the new European health security framework,” health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides told MEPs on Monday.
The EU’s health chief emphasised the infectious diseases agency’s importance in managing the COVID-19 pandemic: “The ECDC has been essential in making sense and in managing this pandemic. With a stronger focus, we will be better prepared for the future.”
She also highlighted that the whole approval process of these ‘very important building blocks’ for the European Health Union has been carried out in less than two years.
“The European Health Union is being built step by step,” said the Parliament’s rapporteur on the cross-border health file, the French liberal MEP Véronique Trillet-Lenoir.
“We will continue this project in the context of discussions on a future convention on the revision of the European treaties,” she added.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has announced a €50 billion investment to strengthen the European health union in her annual State of the Union speech in efforts to concrete the EU as a world leader on health.
MEPs endorsed the deal reached with the Council on extending the mandate of the ECDC with 542 votes in favour, 43 against and 9 abstentions.
This is the first update to ECDC’s mandate since the creation of the centre in 2004.
Following the extension, t he ECDC will coordinate the standardisation of data collection procedures, data validation, analysis, and dissemination of data at the EU level.
In cooperation with the European Commission, national authorities, EU bodies and international organisations, the ECDC’s role is to ensure their respective activities are consistent and complement each other.
In addition, the ECDC will closely monitor the capacity of national health systems to detect, prevent, respond to and recover from communicable disease outbreaks, as well as to identify gaps and provide science-based recommendations.
“A stronger ECDC will be able to issue recommendations to member states regarding health threats preparedness, will be able to host a new network of excellence of EU reference laboratories, and establish an EU health task force for rapid health interventions in the event of a major outbreak,” Kyriakides said.
Polish right-wing lawmaker Joanna Kopcińska, the MEP in charge of negotiating with EU-27 ministers on this file, said that her main goal during the talks was to make sure that the agency’s extended mandate will support but not replace national public health efforts.
“It is necessary to respect the principle of subsidiarity at the EU level in such a way that the EU supports and coordinates the actions of member states where action at the national level alone would be ineffective,” she said.
ECDC director Andrea Ammon called the go-ahead from the Parliament “a significant step towards a safer, better prepared and more resilient Europe.”
“Great trust and responsibility have been placed in ECDC today,” Ammon said in the press release.
Decisions made in 2020 during the COVID-19 emergency are starting “to bear fruit” for the EU’s health union, as the case of reinforcing the European Medicines Agency (EMA) shows.
Parliament also adopted, with 544 votes in favour, 50 against and 10 abstentions, the agreement on a series of measures that will allow the EU to better anticipate and respond to serious cross-border health threats.
The new rules include improved prevention, preparedness and response planning at the EU and national levels. The Commission will be able to formally recognise a public health emergency at the EU level, which would trigger stronger intra-EU cooperation and allow for the timely development and stockpiling of medical countermeasures.
“The new regulation on cross-border threats paves the way for a stronger EU role in preventing preparing and managing health threats,” Kyriakides said.
The legislation also clarifies the procedures for jointly procuring medicines and medical devices, including the possibility to limit parallel procurement and negotiation activities by participating countries, in the case of products purchased jointly at the EU level.
[Edited by Gerardo Fortuna/Nathalie Weatherald]
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