An air pollution health risk assessment estimates the health impact to be expected from measures that affect air quality, in different socioeconomic, environmental and policy circumstances. This publication, from WHO Europe, introduces the concept of air pollution health risk assessment, describing in broad terms how the health risks of outdoor air pollution and its sources […]
Air pollution: assessing the health risks Read More »
The United Kingdom’s health systems have long made the quality of care a high priority, pioneering many tools and policies in this area. Yet despite being a global leader in monitoring and improvement, the United Kingdom does not consistently perform well on international quality benchmarks. This review from the OECD helps to explain why. To
Health Care Quality in the UK Read More »
Vyteris Andriukaitis made the following points in a speech recently: The definition of health as proposed by the World Health Organization is: “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”. Unfortunately for too long we have been focusing on care and cure, while
EU Commissioner for Health V Andriukaitis Read More »
The Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks (SCENIHR) has published its final Opinion on the safety of surgical meshes used in urogynaecological surgery. A key conclusion is that in assessing the risk associated with mesh application, it is important to consider the overall surface area of material used, the product design and
Safety of surgical meshes Read More »
The Commission is supporting EU countries at the forefront of the refugee crisis with grants from the EU Health Programme of over €5.5 million. This money will help address the common health challenges in the most affected Member States. A grant to the International Organisation of Migration (IOM) will be used for testing a personal
Response to the refugee crisis Read More »
The WHO has declared the Zika virus outbreak a “Public Health Emergency of International Concern”. The European Commission has created a central web page with information on the Zika outbreak and how it is being managed in the EU. It will be regularly updated in line with the latest developments. To see more about the
Zika virus in Europe Read More »
A recent paper from the Centre on Global Health Security, Chatham House identifies priority areas for reform as the global health architecture confronts emerging challenges in the post-2015 era. Every country needs strong, resilient and equitable systems that enable all people to live healthy lives so the global health architecture needs to be rethought so it
Rethinking the Global Health System Read More »
Revenues for pharmaceutical companies need to be delinked from sales of antibiotics to avoid their over-use and avert a public health crisis, according to a new report from the Centre on Global Health Security, Chatham House. The main recommendations of the report are: A new business model needs to be developed in which the return on
New business model for antibiotics Read More »
Since the economic crisis, policy changes across Europe appear to be moving countries away from universal health systems with broad coverage to systems where sections of the population are excluded from the full range of publicly available services. A new report from the European Public Health Association analyses these trends across Europe and contrasts the
Impacts of economic policies on access to healthcare Read More »
An important chapter of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) trade negotiations between the EU and US deals with ’Regulatory Cooperation’. Whilst it may sound dull and harmless it poses and extremely serious threat to national governments’ right to regulate, for example to protect public health, consumer rights, workers or the environment. the European
Public health concerns over TTIP Read More »
