Category: Health

A man consulting his health records on his phone

Will consumers be able to choose what happens to their health data through the European Health Data Space?

From our latest medical prescriptions to our exercise habits, everything related to our health says something about us.

/ November 10, 2023

Pushing for fair consumer access to medicines in the EU 60 years on

High prices and shortages of medicines are harming consumers across Europe. This blog is part of our 60th anniversary series, tying the six decades of BEUC’s existence to current day concerns.

/ September 20, 2022

The downsides of moving to digital-only leaflets for medicines with the EU’s pharma reform

In an upcoming EU reform of pharma policy, the pharmaceutical industry is pushing to replace paper leaflets in our medicines with digital leaflets that you can find online, but we don’t think that’s a good idea because of obvious downsides....

/ September 15, 2022

COVID-19 shows blatant need to rethink how we develop medicines

If the coronavirus crisis is described by the media as “an unprecedented crisis”, for scientists it is not.  They knew that a new pandemic would emerge one day. It was only a matter of time. We were not sufficiently prepared...

/ September 23, 2020

COVID-19 and the digitalisation of health: five risks you need to know

Some claim that artificial intelligence (AI) will always be better than natural stupidity, especially when it comes to decisions about health. But it is important to be aware of the risks using AI in health care might entail for us.

/ April 20, 2020

How EU-funded research can deliver to consumers

Between 2021 and 2027, the EU Horizon Europe programme is planning to spend around a whopping 100 billion euros on research projects. No surprise therefore that academics, industry representatives and others will flood Brussels this week to attend the huge...

/ September 24, 2019

E-health: your every personal detail online

New technologies have flooded our lives: many day-to-day products and activities now begin with the prefixes i-, e-, cyber-, info-, techno-, m-, net-, tele-, and the list goes on. It’s easy to get lost in this carrousel of innovation! Digitalisation...

/ June 29, 2018

When medicines cost an arm and a leg. And an eye

Last week, a pharmaceutical company was accused of intentionally inflating the price of one of its medicines by 2,000%[1]. Does this kind of news seem like déjà vu? Most probably, because escalating medicine prices are getting more and more coverage....

/ February 8, 2018

Mhealth – opportunities and privacy risks

Out of the apps on your phone, how many of them are about health, fitness or lifestyle? Quite a few probably. Mobile health (mHealth) is trendy. It has the potential to transform the way healthcare is delivered because it allows...

/ May 10, 2017

Playing with consumers’ health: game over?

When you can’t access a drug treatment because of its price, you’ve probably run out of options. This is what happened some years ago to some patients affected by a severe eye disease [1]. They were denied treatment due to...

/ May 3, 2017