The draft report on the implementation of Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan, presented by Vlad Vasile-Voiculescu (Renew Europe, Romanian), places particular emphasis on the role of taxes and fiscal instruments in the prevention and sustainable funding of the fight against cancer (see EUROPE 13807/23).
This draft own-initiative report, which analyses Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan presented by the European Commission, will be debated by the European Parliament’s Committee on Public Health on Tuesday 14 April. It points out that 40% of cancers are preventable, in particular by reducing consumption of tobacco, alcohol and ultra-processed foods.
However, despite the commitments made, the expected legislative revisions on tobacco and alcohol are worryingly behind schedule. The rapporteur believes that behavioural taxation is one of the most effective and least costly tools for reducing risk factors on a large scale.
Vlad Vasile-Voiculescu is calling on the Commission to “ensure that a guaranteed minimum share is allocated to cancer when distributing the revenues expected from tobacco excise duties and from the fiscal measures on ultra-processed foods established under the Safe Hearts Plan”. Priority should be given to funding prevention, screening, reducing inequalities between Member States and healthcare infrastructures.
The draft report also stresses that such a mechanism would make it possible to secure long-term funding, in a context marked by the reduction in EU4Health funding.
Link to the draft report: https://aeur.eu/f/le8 (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)