Update Issues

EPHA exploded onto the Brussels scene in 1993, just as the European Union first acquired a health competence - Art 129 of the Maastricht Treaty (subsequently Art 152 of the Amsterdam Treaty). This issue of the European Public Health Update celebrates EPHA’s 10th anniversary. We look back over the past ten years to highlight the successes, learn lessons and evaluate how the political context has changed.
Editorial: Celebrating 10 years of public health in Europe
In this issue:
Milestones (...)

Nothing is more important for health than a supply of pure water. Diarrhoea, caused by a lack of safe drinking water, is the biggest killer of children and a major cause of sickness in adults world-wide. At any one time, half the world’s hospital beds are occupied by patients suffering from water-borne diseases.
In this issue:
Editorial - Water: preventing a crisis
How will water shape the 21st century?
Water as a public health good
Roger Aergeerts, WHO European Region (...)

EU Trade Commissioner, Pascal Lamy, will be in a position of awesome power when he attends the next World Trade Organization ministerial meeting in Cancun in September 2003. By then, with the accession agreements signed, he will represent the world’s number one economic power. At the Mexico meeting, he could ensure that Europe’s leadership is social as well as economic by charting a new path for a healthy, just and environmentally-friendly trade.
In this issue: Click on a title to (...)

Change is in the air. In Luxembourg, the work plan for Europe’s new Public Health Programme (2003-2008) is being finalised ready for implementation. In Brussels, Health Commissioner David Byrne believes there is a need for a change in the European Union Treaty - and he is saying so. EPHA welcomes his position. The current legal basis in the Treaty for health protection is very weak. In the absence of political initiatives, it is the European Court of Justice that is making decisions on (...)

Every parent embarks on the greatest experiment of all. Quite literally. As children grow they are exceptionally vulnerable to the physical, social and emotional environment around them. But are we, European citizens, doing enough to protect children and ensure their good health?
In this issue:
Click on the titles below to get to the corresponding article A European approach to child health
Identifying the threats to children’s health in Europe
Interview: Dr Roberto (...)

Eating a well balanced and nutritious diet is the most effective way of ensuring good health. This needs two elements to be in place: a well informed population that makes rational choices about their food intake and a production system that provides access to a wide range of nutritious, safe and healthy food.
In this issue:
Click on the title to get to the corresponding article Food, health and CAP reform
The Common Agricultural Policy at a glance
Making healthy food a factor in (...)

Traditionally, national governments in Europe have guarded jealously their right to manage health care. They claim this "subsidiarity" not only because the health sector is a major employer, procurer and service provider. An estimated eight per cent of the European Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is devoted to health spending.
In this issue:
Click on the title to get to the corresponding article Health care and the internal market
Free movement of patients: is it good for patients and (...)

Sustainable development captures the complex relationship between human beings and their environment. It demonstrates that achieving progress could - and should - mean aiming for a better quality of life rather than targeting greater economic growth alone.
In this issue:
Click on the title to get to the corresponding article.
On the brink of a healthier future?
WHO’s vision for Rio +10
Yasmin van Schirnding, World Health Organization
What role for Europe?
Interview: Jan (...)

The health gap between the rich and the poor in Europe appears to be widening. Recently, European Health Commissioner David Byrne expressed his concern giving the following example: ’In England, the death rate from coronary heart disease is now three times higher among unskilled men than among professionals and the gap has widened sharply in the last 20 years.’ Through some key initiatives, the EU has made efforts to counter this disturbing development. The problem for Commissioner Byrne (...)