19/04/2005 (Agence Europe) - On 8 April, the Luxembourg EU Council Presidency held a conference in Luxembourg on access to health care in a single market. During the conference, attended by 300 representatives of the health industry in Europe, the Luxembourg Health Minister, Mars Di Bartolomeo, stressed the fact that, in the field of health and social security, services provided are not to be considered as goods but as a different kind of service in that they must meet accessibility, quality and solidarity requirements. On the base of a report established by Professor Yves Jorens of Ghent University, participants mainly looked at the possibility of placing health services in the category of ”social services of general interest” so that they may be excluded from the scope of competition law. The report by Mr Jorens is available on the Internet at: http://www.mss.etat.lu.