RESOLUTION OF THE COUNCIL AND THE MINISTERS FOR HEALTH OF THE MEMBER STATES MEETING WITHIN THE COUNCIL of 13 November 1992 on the monitoring and surveillance of communicable diseases (92/C 326/01)

THE COUNCIL AND THE MINISTERS FOR HEALTH OF THE MEMBER STATES MEETING WITHIN THE COUNCIL,

HAVING regard to the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community,

HAVING regard to the relevant measures already adopted by the Community, for example in respect of water quality,

HAVING regard to the current activities organized or funded by the Community and the World Health Organization to foster exchanges of information and links between health institutions in Member States,

NOTING the declaration of the European Council held in Birmingham on 16 October 1992,

WHEREAS outbreaks of communicable disease have serious economic and social consequences for individuals and the Member States;

WHEREAS the mobility of people and the increasing trade in food, particularly as a result of the development of the internal market, increase the importance of more comparable and more assessable data and of timely exchanges of information collected by the Member States in order to monitor outbreaks of communicable disease;

WHEREAS better information could lead to quicker action to reduce the number of cases associated with an outbreak of disease and therefore the resources required to contain the outbreak; whereas particular attention should be paid, in this context, to early warning systems;

RECALLING their decisions establishing a programme of cooperative action for the prevention and control of AIDS and their recommendation establishing cooperation between toxicology centres with the Community;

RECOGNIZING the value of the cooperative exchanges between the health institutions in the Member States which take place within the Community's action programme to combat the non-communicable diseases of cancer;

RECOGNIZING that the arrangements for, and establishment of, systems within the Member States for identifying, monitoring and controlling outbreaks of communicable disease are the responsibility of the Member States;

RECOGNIZING that any new arrangements for improving cooperation between the Member States should make best use of the available resources and avoid duplicating existing arrangements and only be introduced in areas of communicable disease in which cooperation is of the greatest added value, particularly with regard to action undertaken by the Community;

RECOGNIZING that arrangements for greater cooperation in the area of communicable disease between Member States with the assistance of the Commission could provide a useful example of cooperation in other health-care sectors for combating serious and widespread diseases,

INVITE the Commission:

1. To consider, particularly in relation to the development of the internal market and the movement of people between the Member States, the existing arrangements which provide for cooperation between the Member States in the field of monitoring and control of communicable diseases, including food-borne diseases, together with such arrangements established by the World Health Organization.

2. In the light of this work to produce thereafter a brief report to the Council by 31 December 1993 examining the following;

- the desirability of improving, within the Community, the coverage and effectiveness of existing networks between Member States (including data-processing networks) and also the desirability of maintaining, establishing or strengthening coordination between them for monitoring outbreaks of communicable diseases, where such action could add to the value of existing measures,

- the desirability of agreeing guidelines for the Member States on ways in which data collected by them could be made more useful, more timely and more comparable, and also more compatible,

- the value of collecting data from the Member States on a limited number of rare and serious diseases which require large samples for epidemiological study,

- the need for better utilization of relevant findings of research programmes and better integration of pilot projects undertaken by the Community and the Member States on communicable disease,

- the resources including, where necessary, additional costs arising from the specific situations of Member States, needed to implement any proposals, the benefits which may be expected and the use of pilot projects before proposals are implemented,

- possibly, suitable proposals to be given priority in the light, inter alia, of their estimated cost-effectiveness,

- the value of regular reviews of this kind in the future and their frequency.

3. For the purpose of assisting them in preparing their report, to consult experts drawn from and nominated by the Member States with experience in the management of existing intergovernmental networks on communicable diseases.