Starting in January 2024, Belgium will take on the position of the Council Presidency for six months, acting as head of the Council, moderating trilogues, and setting the political agenda of the EU. The central priorities of the Belgian Presidency are the following: defending the rule of law and democracy, strengthening competitiveness, managing a green and just transition, reinforcing an equitable health agenda, protecting people and borders, and promoting a global Europe. The SHD Coalition welcomes the Belgian Presidency’s agenda, as this plan offers many opportunities for the Coalition to complement and support its objectives.
The Presidency’s initiative to create a comprehensive EU health workforce strategy is a significant step to facilitate practices for cardiovascular disease prevention, early detection, and treatment. A robust workforce empowers healthcare professionals not only to respond to health issues but also to proactively engage in campaigns that foresee and address emerging health crises, such as structural heart disease.
The Belgian Health Ministry aims to address unmet needs through research and innovation, however, in addition to investing in the development of new innovations, it is equally important to ensure that existing innovations are accessible to patients through awareness, availability, and reimbursement. In the case of SHD, digital stethoscopes are an effective innovation to concretely support early detection, but without integration into the patient pathway they cannot reach their full potential.
Given that socio-economic factors are deeply intertwined with an individual’s ability to access competent health services, the SHD Coalition supports the decision to tackle healthcare accessibility through their social agenda. Despite heart disease being one of the main causes of death amongst women, they are significantly less diagnosed and treated for these conditions than men. This inequality is thought to be rooted to social dynamics. In order to improve access to early detection and treatment for SHD, we must tackle social inequalities that hinder our progress.
Belgium holds the presidency of the Council of the European Union in the first half of 2024, from 1 January to 30 June. Here are the six priorities of the Belgian presidency for this semester.
Defending rule of law, democracy, and unity.
Strengthening our competitiveness
Pursuing a green and just transition
Reinforcing our social and health agenda
Protecting people and borders
Promoting a global Europe
In this note, we outline how the Presidency’s health policy framework can accommodate the needs of Europe’s growing structural heart disease patient population.
Addressing the healthcare workforce challenge
The creation of a comprehensive EU health workforce strategy is a significant step to facilitate practices for cardiovascular disease prevention, early detection, and treatment. A robust workforce empowers healthcare professionals not only to respond to health issues but also to proactively engage in campaigns that foresee and address emerging health crises. While structural heart disease (SHD) is already estimated to effect 240 000 people in Belgium, this number is expected to rise to 420 000 by 2040, due to the ageing population and rise of chronic disease. To mitigate the burden this will have on the future healthcare workforce, we call for the EU to significantly consider prevention and early detection practices by multi-disciplinary and integrated teams in future strategies for the health workforce.
Needs-drive innovation
The Belgian Health Ministry’s commitment to lead research, development and innovation targeting the most pressing unmet needs in Europe will work to streamline research and resources. However, in addition to investing in the development of new innovations, it is equally important to ensure that existing innovations are accessible to patients through awareness, availability, and reimbursement. Today, innovative technologies that can address unmet needs and relieve the burden of the workforce shortage are validated and available, however they lack processes to enable adoption, expansion of use, and measurement of results. In the case of SHD, digital stethoscopes are an effective innovation to concretely support early detection, but without integration into the patient pathway they cannot reach their full potential. By prioritising the adoption and diffusion of existing innovations, the Belgian Presidency can cost-effectively address unmet needs with existing, but underused technologies. Furthermore, streamlining this process of accessibility will be beneficial to distributing any future needs-driven innovation.
Combatting Inequality in Healthcare Access
Given that socio-economic factors are deeply intertwined with an individual’s ability to access competent health services, the SHD Coalition supports the decision to tackle healthcare accessibility through their social agenda. For example, despite heart disease being one of the main causes of death amongst women, they are significantly less diagnosed and treated for these conditions than men. This discrepancy is thought to be rooted to social dynamics; women are less likely to go to the GP when in pain or their symptoms are more likely to be attributed to stress or anxiety. In order to improve access to early detection and treatment for SHD, we must tackle social inequalities that hinder our progress.
The SHD Coalition is looking forward to supporting the upcoming Belgian Council Presidency. As a coalition of expert stakeholders, we will work to amplify your priorities to address the growing burden of structural heart disease and hope to collaborate more closely in the coming months.