Health Systems & Health Inequalities

CPME Rapporteur: Dr Jacques DE HALLER (CH)
CPME Secretariat: Mr Dimitri EERENS

Health systems are the infrastructure for delivering healthcare, therefore it is vital that their design and priorities are coherent with the aim of ensuring the best possible quality of health and access to healthcare to every patient. The challenges facing health systems are becoming increasingly complex: under-resourcing, shortages of health professionals, and health inequalities are some of the problems which require cross-sectoral policy action. CPME contributes to these debates to ensure that doctors’ experiences in improving health systems and the social determinants of health inform the policy solutions. One of the suggestions put forward is for the European Commission to issue benchmarks for minimum capacities of resources including a ratio for health professionals per patient to support Member States in meeting safe staffing levels and well-equipped systems both for baseline universal health coverage and health emergencies.