ECO Welcomes the European Health Data Space and its Opportunities for Cancer Care

On 3 May, the European Commission published a new legal proposal to construct a pan-European Health Data Space. The European Health Data Space aims to promote better exchange and access to different types of health data, not only to support healthcare delivery but also for health research and health policy making purposes.

Responding to the publication, Prof Andreas Charalambous, President of the European Cancer Organisation said:

“We warmly welcome the publication of the European Health Data Space proposal. Like other therapeutic areas, the cancer community has long seen the need for serious initiative to achieve the full potential of data cooperation across borders for the improvement of research, care and health policy.

In common with the European Parliament and others, we will now be scrutinising the detail of the legislative proposal in order to identify any opportunities for improvement or any missing elements, bringing healthcare professionals, patients and the wider cancer stakeholder community for this through our Digital Health Network. Indeed, as set out in that Network’s position paper, we actively wish to see the challenges to data interoperability overcome and identify the European Health Data Space as a key chance to drive progress.

To assist this scrutiny process, on Thursday 23 June the European Cancer Organisation is convening a special Community 365 Roundtable Meeting on the European Health Data Space. We invite all those with an interest to join us.”