Report on health research priorities

Report on health research priorities

The Independent Expert Group on the Future of European Public Health Research, set up in 2012, issued a report on the future of public health research. The objective of this Group is to take stock of the impacts, challenges and limitations of EU-funded public health research under the current and previous research framework programmes, and to identify priorities for future research. 

The Group recommends priorities for research funding in four fields: 

• Health promotion: understanding of the barriers to the adoption of healthy lifestyles needs to be increased and used to develop effective interventions.
• Disease prevention:  cutting-edge research on the causes and management of disease needs to be continued, and focus on ‘deprogramming’ of interventions that are known to be ineffective or too costly.
• Health services:  this needs to address innovations that improve the humanity, quality, safety and efficiency of care and support a shift towards prevention.
• Health policy: a focus on the major policy challenges for public health is required, also relating to major societal challenges.

For the report: http://ec.europa.eu/research/health/news_en.html.