HAIS Awareness Day
17 October 2007
European Parliament
On 17 October 2007, HFE will bring patients, healthcare workers and experts from across the EU to the European Parliament to meet with MEPs and other relevant decision-makers discuss HCAIs. The event aims at stressing the need for immediate and decisive EU action to help reduce the 50,000 fatalities caused by healthcare associated infections (HCAIs) in Europe each year.
According to the Commission’s 2005 Communication on Healthcare Associated Infections, there are approximately three million healthcare associated infections (HCAIs) and 50,000 attributable deaths in the European Union each year. HFE believes this to be a health crisis requiring pan-European leadership and co-ordination from the European Commission in co-operation with the Member States. HFE welcomes Commissioner Kyprianou’s personal commitment that the Commission and European Centre for Disease Control (ECDC) will prioritise the issue of HCAIs in 2008.
HFE will though this event seek to stimulate the debate on the steps that need to be taken to tackle HCAIs by exploring existing best practice in the Member States, and considering what action can be taken by all stakeholders involved. There is a great deal of expertise in Europe and examples of best practice that need to effectively assessed, communicated and their urgent adoption actively encouraged. As the ECDC’s First European Communicable Disease Epidemiological Report identifies up to 30% of HCAIs are preventable.