EU countries seek use of defence funds for critical medicines
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Health ministers from Belgium, Czechia, Cyprus, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain have called for a Critical Medicines Act set to be proposed this week to be integrated within broader EU strategic autonomy and security efforts, putting the measure effectively under the umbrella of defence funding.
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The move seeks to access the €800 billion the European Commission is expected to mobilise over the next four years through the Rearm Europe plan, the main principles of which were agreed by leaders at last week's extraordinary EU summit.
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The ministers argue that their proposal aligns with the United States’ Defence Production Act, which designates pharmaceutical supply chains as a national security issue.
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In an op-ed, the minister say that Europe, once a leader in pharmaceutical production, "now depends on Asia for 60–80% of its pharmaceutical supply." Price pressure on cheap generics, along with higher labour and environmental costs, are the main drivers of this shift, they write.
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Early blueprints of the next seven-year EU budget suggest that its health portion could be merged with other funds or even eliminated altogether.
The proposed mechanism would allow for increased health spending at least at the national level by loosening EU budget rules, enabling higher expenditure without penalties.
In practice, this would mean that defence spending—potentially expanded to include critical medicines—of up to 1.5% of GDP would be exempt from EU spending limits for four years.
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Health ministers from Belgium, Czechia, Cyprus, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain have called for a Critical Medicines Act set to be proposed this week to be integrated within broader EU strategic autonomy and security efforts, putting the measure effectively under the umbrella of defence funding.
[...]
The move seeks to access the €800 billion the European Commission is expected to mobilise over the next four years through the Rearm Europe plan, the main principles of which were agreed by leaders at last week's extraordinary EU summit.
[...]
The ministers argue that their proposal aligns with the United States’ Defence Production Act, which designates pharmaceutical supply chains as a national security issue.
[...]
In an op-ed, the minister say that Europe, once a leader in pharmaceutical production, "now depends on Asia for 60–80% of its pharmaceutical supply." Price pressure on cheap generics, along with higher labour and environmental costs, are the main drivers of this shift, they write.
[...]
Early blueprints of the next seven-year EU budget suggest that its health portion could be merged with other funds or even eliminated altogether.
The proposed mechanism would allow for increased health spending at least at the national level by loosening EU budget rules, enabling higher expenditure without penalties.
In practice, this would mean that defence spending—potentially expanded to include critical medicines—of up to 1.5% of GDP would be exempt from EU spending limits for four years.
[...]
Thus would never happen in America
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System shared this topic on