Wealth and Equity

EPHA has responded to the European Commission’s (Directorate General on Enterprise and Industry) public consultation on "Information to Patients" on medicinal products.
Background
The provision of information to patients has been under discussion at European level for a number of years. The report on current practices with regard to the provision of information to patients on medicinal products was released in December 2007 as a communication to the European Parliament and Council from (...)

The Health and Consumer Protection Directorate of the European Commission recently published a study paper on “The contribution of health to the economy in the European Union”.
In the words of Commissioner Markos Kyprianou, the publication “confirms the high cost falling on Europe’s economies as a result of illness [...]. Of particular relevance to Europe, with its ageing population, [the authors] show how poor health increases the likelihood of early retirement. Taken (...)

The European Commission adopted on 27 April 2005 a Programme for Action to strengthen Europe’s support to confront HIV/AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis outside the EU’s borders. The initiative follows the promise made by Commissioner Louis Michel, in charge of Development and Humanitarian Aid, to do better, do more and quicker in delivering on the Millennium Development Goals (MDG).
The Commission proposes a series of concrete and cheap but effective activities such as the distribution of (...)

The 2005 annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) took place on 26-30 January in Davos (Switzerland). One of the central themes of this year’s meeting was the fight against the AIDS epidemic.
Today, about 40 million people are living with AIDS. About half live in Africa, where there are over 8,000 new infections each day.
In his opening address, UK Prime Minister Tony Blair appealed for more aid for Africa and committed the UK to provide nearly one sixth of a World Health (...)

The World Health Organization has launched a new initiative, the Health Leadership Scheme (HLS) to train the next generation of health leaders.
The WHO will recruit young health professionals to a two-year work and training programme, specifically aimed at strengthening the knowledge and skills essential for leadership roles in public health at all levels - national, regional and global. A grant of US$ 5 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation provides funding for this programme (...)

The WTO’s 147 member governments approved on 1 August 2004 a package of framework and other agreements on the Doha Agenda work programme. In WTO’s words, the package is ’designed to focus the negotiations and raise them to a new level’.
The package deals with a number of ¨hot¨ topics such as agriculture, cotton, non-agricultural market access (NAMA), special and differential treatment (SDT), development and trade in services.
The package is the result of long-lasting negotiations by five (...)

The OECD Employment Outlook, a review of labour market trends and issues predicts some reduction in unemployment rates over the next two years. But the organisation urges governments to avoid taking too narrow an approach to job creation and to consider wider economic and social objectives as well.
The OECD figures show that the UK works an average 100 hours a year more than workers in the rest of the European Union and its employees have the least protection in the developed world except (...)

A WHO report reveals that violence devastates lives and also imposes major economic costs on societies around the world, some of which spend more than 4% of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on dealing with violence-related injuries.
The economic dimensions of interpersonal violence, compiles currently available information on the costs of violence against children, women and the elderly and among young people, including information on the cost-effectiveness of preventing violence.
1.6 (...)

Spending on health and healthcare in most OECD countries has risen dramatically over the past five years. Combined with lower economic growth, the increase in health spending has driven the share of health expenditure as a percentage of GDP up from an average 7.8% in 1997 to 8.5% in 2002. This is in sharp contrast to the period 1992 - 1997, when the share of GDP spent on health remained almost unchanged.
The OECD Health Report 2004 indicates that the main drivers for the increased (...)

17-22 May 2004, the World Health Assembly is being held in Geneva. On the agenda are the global strategies to promote healthy diets and physical activity, and to improve reproductive health. Other themes include action to limit the impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, updates on WHO activity on health crises and mental health.
WHO Director-General, Dr LEE Jong-wook announced the creation of a new Commission to gather evidence on the social and environmental causes of health inequities, and how (...)