Pandemic influenza: are Europe's institutions prepared?

Abstract

In December 2005, the new European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) indicated that the European Union's (EU) preparedness for a possible influenza pandemic would be ‘more or less’ complete by 2007 and noted ‘Europe will be much better prepared than any other part of the world’.1 Over the past year there has been considerable activity in planning, coordinating, and testing preparedness planning by EU institutions to meet this aim. But if effective protection is to be achieved, more attention still needs to be paid to efforts to stimulate research and development, redress inequalities in the distribution of resources including vaccines and antiviral drugs, and strengthen the coordinating role and authority of national and international institutions. According to a survey presented at the EU-World Health Organization (WHO) joint workshop in Copenhagen in October 2005 30 of the 52 states and territories of the WHO European region had published national influenza pandemic preparedness plans, and a further 18 had draft plans.2 Within the EU, 19 countries indicated that they had published a plan, and six plans were being finalised. During 2005, EU institutions demonstrated a leadership role in coordinating and assisting member states' preparation efforts. This work has included workshops where preparedness plans and best practice approaches were communicated and debated and, in November 2005, the issuance of two official communications outlining and clarifying the specific role of EU institutions in response to the health threat.3,4 Again in November 2005, the European Commission (EC) led a large-scale desktop simulation exercise (termed ‘Common Ground’) to test the robustness and coherence of member states' responses to influenza pandemic scenarios in Europe. Whilst there have been informal murmurings about the inadequacy of the institutional response, somewhat disappointingly the formal conclusions (and the scope for rapidly learning any lessons) …