A delegation from the European Cancer Patient Coalition, including ECPC President Prof. Francesco De Lorenzo, Board Member Dan Cimpoeru, and Head of EU Affairs Francesco Florindi, met with the European Commission’s unit in charge of the work on Health Technology Assessments (DG Health and Food Safety, Directorate B, Unit B4).
The purpose of the meeting was to share the views of ECPC on the topic of Health Technology Assessment, particularly following the response to the public consultation regarding the future of the EU cooperation on HTA, which the European Commission concluded in early 2017. The European Cancer Patient Coalition, moreover, has now joined the HTA Network in the stakeholders’ pool, representing patients across Europe.
In this meeting, ECPC reminded the European Commission that one of the core goals of ECPC is to fight and reduce the increasing inequalities that cancer patients are facing in Europe. Therefore, a stronger EU cooperation in Health Technology Assessments could help in reducing inequalities in access to innovative technologies, in particular in cancer treatments.
ECPC also shared with the Commission an analysis of the legal basis for carrying out an initiative to strengthen cooperation on Health Technology Assessments at the European level.