Strasbourg, 24/05/2007 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 23 May, in Strasbourg, the European Parliament corrected the vote by its internal market committee in favour of reintroducing health services into the services directive (EUROPE 9423). Paragraph 71 of the report by French Socialist Bernadette Verngaud on the impact of excluding health services from the directive on services in the internal market has, as the rapporteur had hoped, been rejected by 574 votes to 54 and 6 abstentions. Although the Parliament thus confirms its position on the specific nature of health services and the need for a specific legal framework, it nonetheless calls for considerable freedom for patients and practitioners in the health sector. By 341 votes to 307 and 12 abstentions, the Parliament invited the European Commission to present a proposal taking account of the Vergnaud report as adopted and Court of Justice rulings on patients' rights, but explicitly calling for patients' access to health services to be as wide as possible throughout Europe and for health professionals to have the freedom to provide services and to establish themselves professionally (amendment by Toine Manders, NL, on behalf of the ALDE).
Adopted by an overwhelming majority of 514 votes to 132 and 8 abstentions, the report by Bernadette Vergnaud sets out in about one hundred paragraphs many principles that the Parliament is keen to see guaranteed in the legislation to ensure respect of patients' rights and to safeguard the national health systems. It thus considers it is appropriate to ensure that all European citizens, whatever their level of income or place of residence, should have equal access to health care within a reasonable time at an affordable cost. This is to ensure respect of the principles of universality, quality, security, continuity and solidarity, thus contributing to the Union's social and territorial cohesion while guaranteeing the financial viability of the national health care systems. It recalls that the patients must be able to benefit from equal access to appropriate treatment close to their place of residence and in their mother tongue. The Parliament therefore considers that it would be appropriate to ensure better application of the 1998 directive on transparency in order to speed up the marketing of medicinal products, support innovation and security of medicines and give greater encouragement to the use of the centralised marketing authorisation procedure. It stresses that any political initiative relating to medical services should, as far as possible, be the subject of a legislative act at parliamentary level rather than ad hoc development by Court of Justice rulings.
The Parliament also invites the Commission to encourage the introduction of an online health and tele-medicine system, and calls on member state governments to actively encourage such initiatives. It encourages the development of networks of reference centres, including the electronic reference centre for certain rare, specific or chronic diseases, as well as exchange of knowledge on best treatment practices and on the organisation of health care systems between the different Union countries. The Parliament nonetheless stresses that the mobility of patients and that of health professionals should not be an excuse for justifying the lack of investment by any member state in its own healthcare system (amendment by Luxembourg Socialist Robert Goebbels). It hopes a European charter on patients' rights will be adopted on the basis of the various charters already in existence in member states and work carried out by non-governmental organisations. In the context of greater professional mobility in Europe, it invites the Commission to establish a legal obligation for national authorities to exchange information on registration and disciplinary matters concerning healthcare professionals with a view to ensuring patient security (378 votes in favour, 275 against and 7 abstentions). (oj)