Brussels, 16/07/2008 (Agence Europe) -Speaking before the MEPs of the committee on the environment and public health of the European Parliament, Roselyne Bachelot stressed that three of the priorities of the French Presidency include a health aspect: the Energy/Climate package (health impact), immigration (a Euromed Health meeting is to tackle the problem of diabetes, amongst other things) and the healthcheck of the common agricultural policy (impact on nutrition).
During the course of this second half of 2008, the French health minister is hoping for progress in the fields of: (1) sanitary safety: a meeting on improved coordination of the management of sanitary risks will be held in Angers on the sidelines of the informal Health Council of 8-9 September; the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) will be involved in this and the French Presidency hopes to be able to start to prepare work to revise the mandate of the ECDC, the board of administration of which is to be renewed at a meeting in Paris in mid-November; (2) ageing and dependency: Alzheimer's disease, a priority of the French Presidency, will be the subject of a conference to be held in Paris on 30-31 October, with the objective of preparing a European plan to fight this disease, the minister announced; (3) establishing a Europe of Health for patients: work on the proposed directive on cross-border healthcare kicked off on 8 July within the Health Group of the Council; (4) determinants of health: Ms Bachelot spoke of tobacco in particular, with the recommendation for a tobacco-free environment and the Convention of the WHO (aspects such as advertising, packaging and relations with industry are to be tackled as part of preparations for the Durban conference on implementation of the Convention, to be held this November); tobacco will also be at the centre of a meeting of health directors to be held in Paris on 2 October; (5) medicines: the minister voiced hopes that agreement will be found quickly on the proposed directive to simplify the procedures whereby the authorities approve any changes made by a laboratory holding an MA (market authorisation) to any characteristic (manufacturing process, new indication, updating package leaflet) of a drug already authorised, which is the subject of a report by Ms Grossetête; she also spoke of her anticipation of the forthcoming Medicines package of the Commission and, in particular, the proposal on the fight against counterfeiting. Other proposals are in the process of being drawn up, such as the communication on rare diseases, another subject of importance for the French Presidency, the minister stressed, going on to quote work underway on organ donation, patient security, nosocomial diseases and resistance to antibiotics.
Answering questions put by the MEPs, Roselyne Bachelot said that there is "little chance of reaching an agreement at first reading before the end of the French Presidency" on the directive concerning cross-border health care. But "I will push negotiations at the Council as far as I can", she promised, stressing that the prior authorisation for hospital care makes it possible for the national systems to keep in place their regulation capability. In response to those who spoke of a risk of inequality in access to healthcare, she replied that "this inequality already exists". The directive, on the other hand, "brings clarifications", and its complementarity with regulation 1408 will guarantee improved reimbursement. Lastly, the minister described the Green Paper on professional mobility, which is scheduled for the autumn, as an "excellent initiative".
"Counterfeiting is not just an intellectual property problem, it puts public health at risk", said Ms Bachelot, who would like the entire production and distribution chain to be "controlled" and "well supervised". Various measures (traceability, data matrix, RFID and other techniques) may contribute, but they must be European, explain the minister, who has a PhD in pharmacy and did not hesitate to defend the "monopoly of the pharmacist", which "helps to ensure the impermeability of the system". (O.J./trans.fl)