Experts to gather online at #EAPM health-care conference

Tomorrow (24 March), the Brussels-based Alliance will hold its 8th annual conference and, while it was originally scheduled to be held ‘live’ in the Belgian capital, due to the COVID-19 crisis the event will now be a ‘virtual’ experience, taking place online, writes European Alliance for Personalised Medicine (EAPM) Executive Director Denis Horgan.

Current events will certainly not stop a swathe of stakeholders and experts ‘gathering’ for the key event entitled “Defining the healthcare ecosystem to determine value” and held under the auspices of the Croatia EU Presidency.

Ahead of the conference, EAPM’s Executive Director Denis Horgan said: “Europe and, indeed, the rest of the world, is facing a serious challenge with this highly contagious and dangerous virus.

“The need for pan-EU member state, European Commission and parliamentary co-ordination and cooperation in healthcare has never been more obvious, nor has the need for us to work together to swiftly integrate innovation into health-care systems.

“EAPM, its members and partners, have always worked towards these goals and, despite the circumstances, tomorrow’s conference will continue in that vein.”

“This year’s conference will certainly be looking closely at healthcare system readiness, or lack thereof, generally speaking and certainly in the context of COVID-19,” Horgan added.

Views from participants

Also speaking ahead of the online discussions and Q&A sessions, Tiemo Wölken, Member of the European Parliament, said: “When it comes to the value of molecular diagnostics, for patients, this lies in safer and more effective therapies, as well as increased confidence and certainty in their treatment decisions.

“Physicians, meanwhile, would be better informed to make the best possible individual treatment decision for their patients, and payers would see more cost-effective healthcare and better budget allocation.”

Paul Naish, global director, Oncology Advocacy and Government Affairs, AstraZeneca, said: “Timely results from biomarker testing allows patients to avoid treatments which won’t work for them, and where appropriate benefit from the targeted treatments that have been delivered from advances in science.

“The big challenge is to ensure that patients across Europe have access to the right testing at the right time, and addressing specific barriers to this needs more attention in the EU debate,” he added.

Meanwhile, Beata Jagielska, of the Polish Alliance for Personalised Medicine, said: ““Europe is behind the US in testing and, because advances can’t reach a patient who isn’t tested, the EU needs to fill this gap.”

And James N’Dow, guidelines office chairman, European Association of Urology, gave the example that: “The number of men being diagnosed with prostate cancer across Europe has increased over recent years.

“Unfortunately, the problem of prostate cancer will only worsen, with projections suggesting that, by 2060, there will be an increase by around 32 million in the number of men aged over 65.

“We need to work hard to make policymakers aware of the situation,” N’Dow added.

MEP Sirpa Pietikainen said: “Going forward, Europe needs consistency across disease areas, and that potential efficiencies for agencies need to be identified.

“The ultimate aim is faster patient and citizen access to diagnostics with proven value and subsequent treatment where required.

“For example,” the Finnish deputy added, “It is estimated that about 30 million people living in the European Union suffer from a rare disease. Since the adoption of the orphan drug directive, between 6,000-7,000 rare diseases were identified in Europe, and this is a good indicator of the incentive to innovate in this field.”

As well as discussing the latest in the COVID-19 crisis, topics to be addressed at the conference will include the need for investment in access to biomarker testing (with aspects including infrastructure, funding and education), as well as a close look at interoperability, collection and sharing issues in respect of genomics data and the European Health Data Space.

Data-sharing projects such as MEGA+ can clearly only be leveraged effectively when these elements are in place.

Other topics are set to include:

• How does Europe reconcile rapid access to innovation while incentivizing necessary continued research to demonstrating value and societal benefits of new medical products, including IVDs?
• What specific data elements would allow for efficient assessment of products providing significant benefit to patients?
• How do we best explain the need for both clinical research and ongoing data collection to patients and society and its benefits to both?

The link to the conference, which will go live at here on Tuesday, is available by clicking here.

Around and about as the crisis develops

At the time of writing, things are changing and escalating quickly in Europe in respect of the current COVID-19 situation.

Germany and Greece have stepped up their reaction still further and have told the population not to leave their houses unless absolutely necessary. Germany, in fact, has banned ‘gatherings’ of more than two people at the pain of ‘consequences’.

Meanwhile, Chancellor Angela Merkel has herself gone into quarantine and will receive regular testing for the virus.

In Belgium, Health Minister Maggie De Block says the crisis and Belgium’s reaction to it will last “at least eight more weeks”. The minister is basic this on the curve seen in China and South Korea, she said over the weekend.

“A country must take the first drastic measures no later than four weeks after the virus has spread,” she added. “We have already done that after two weeks.”

It turns out that De Block is far from impressed with the ‘herd immunity’ approaches pushed to the fore in the Netherlands and the UK, saying they are dangerous and would spread the virus.

And doubtless the minister will not want her country to go the same way as Spain, which is poised to be ‘the next Italy’ in the context of the virus.

The Spanish are in a state of lockdown, with the death toll from the virus now exceeding the 1,000 mark. Worse, the numbers are set to go up and up…

By Friday, Spain had 19,980 cases (35% in the Madrid region and 16% in Catalonia). The country is believed to be roughly a week behind Italy - the world’s worst-hit nation.

Staff in both Italy and Spain are now demanding more protective equipment. This has surely  contributed to Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides urging companies across the EU to manufacture equipment for health workers.

“We are calling on all companies, big or small, to join the effort to provide #COVID19 healthcare workers with the support they need to save lives. Spirit of solidarity is now more important than ever,” Kyriakides wrote in a Tweet.

What next, then?

When it comes to a Covid-19 vaccine, don’t hold your breath, as it were. MEP and EAPM stalwart Peter Liese said in the last few days that there’s “no scenario that all the Europeans will be vaccinated” in the next eight-or-so months, even if a vaccine against coronavirus comes to market by then.

Liese puts his immediate faith in finding therapies, and there’s a “huge responsibility” for the European Medicines Agency as well as the European medical community to pool data and see which drugs are working, he added.

As for the economy going forward, beleaguered Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has called for an EU “Marshall Plan” to fight the spread of Covid-19, as well as to rebuild the economy. He said: “We are making an extraordinary fiscal effort, but it is important that it is not only at the national level.”

Encouragingly, the Commission has triggered a “general escape clause” in respect of the eurozone’s rules on budgetary discipline.

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Friday (20 March): “This is new and never done before,” and called on the bloc’s finance ministers to approve the decision quickly.

A variety of financial schemes, plans and prop-ups are already underway in France, Germany, Denmark, and Portugal. This hasn’t stopped Asian financial markets falling through the floor, however, despite even President Donald Trump trying to get a package through the senate in the US.

And finally, back in Italy, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has announced that all “non-essential” factories in the country must shut down. The logic being: “We slow down the productive engine of the country, but we don’t stop it.”

Supermarkets, pharmacies, banks, post offices and public transport will remain open.

As will EAPM’s conference, so here’s that link again. 

Share this article: