EuroMed Workshop Health
4 - 5 December 2007
Report of the EuroMed Workshop
on Communicable Diseases and Health Systems
EUROPEAN COMMISSION
Report of the EuroMed Workshop
on Communicable Diseases and Health Systems
(December 4th & 5th, 2007 in Brussels)
(Final Vers. 16.1.2008)
1. Background and Introduction
The EuroMed Workshop on communicable diseases and health systems was organised by
the European Commission (General Directorates EuropeAid and SANCO), in cooperation
with the Portuguese EU presidency in Brussels on December 4th and 5th, 2007. This
workshop was held at the request of the Conference of Foreign Ministers of Euromed
countries held in Tampere – Finland in November 2006.
The conclusions of this Workshop are intended to contribute to the preparation of a
Ministerial EuroMed Conference on health to be held at a later stage.
Two areas had to be covered: Communicable diseases surveillance and control on one
hand, and more general issues of health systems (quality, sustainability, equity) on the other
hand.
More than 20 invited experts of EU and Med partner countries were requested to give
presentations on their own experiences, views and recommendations in each of the two
areas, with a focus on the added value of international cooperation and cross-country
exchange.
Representatives from 9 Med partner countries and 17 EU member states discussed the
experiences and examples of cooperation and exchange presented and lessons learnt and
recommendations for future international cooperation in the EuroMed region were collected.
The small work group setting that followed the plenary discussions allowed a very open and
frank discussion of the major issues and difficulties. This was an indicator of a good level of
mutual trust established and indicates that future work should give sufficient room to
interactive exchange in such settings.
The workshop participants had been provided with references to the relevant EU policy
documents and legislation and an inventory of some of the many instit