The current COVID-19 outbreak has revealed structural weaknesses and the vulnerability of European healthcare systems, and it has highlighted the need for a common and coordinated response to health threats. Now more than ever, we urgently need more EU actions on health.

On 1st October 2020, the European Parliament Interest Group began its second mandate, sup-ported in its day-to-day activity by Health First Europe (HFE). Relaunching the Interest Group has been a priority for us. Now, as we celebrate MedTech Week 2020, we must build on the momentum we are generating together to reimagine our healthcare systems.

The Interest Group’s new mandate focuses on prioritising innovation on the EU health and so-cial care agenda, raising awareness of patient-centric solutions for sustainable, accessible and resilient health systems, and seeking broad support from a wide range of MEPs with a view to implement innovative solutions for patients and healthcare professionals.

We believe the Parliamentary Interest Group is an important vehicle not only to support MEPs to play a stronger role in improving public health, but also to foster open dialogue with stake-holders on the future of our healthcare systems. It serves as a platform to help bring forward concrete ideas and solutions for all the challenges we face as citizens when it comes to access-ing high-quality health and social care.

The Group has a key role to play in discussion on the EU4Health programme, as well as in the Conference on the Future of Europe. The agenda for the coming months covers issues such as new ways to deliver healthcare through an integrated and patient-centred approach, the need to establish effective prevention policies within healthcare systems, and the exploitation of digital solutions.

We have a duty and opportunity to rebuild and strengthen our health systems and co-create safe, innovative, robust and resilient health systems which are future-proofed against any up-coming health-related emergency shocks.

To highlight the critical importance and vital role of the health workforce, we decided to launch a debate series with a session dedicated to the backbone of our healthcare systems: its workers. Our discussion was designed to address several points health worker competency and equip-ment in tackling disease outbreaks; the role of education and cross-border responses to public health threats; the use of digital technologies in training and the use of AI in patient-centred care.

Last but not least, it was an opportunity to discuss concrete solutions to tackle the uneven distribution of healthcare systems capacity.

I strongly believe that greater dialogue must exists amongst interested stakeholders and policy-makers to facilitate patient-centric care across the continuum of care – from prevention, to diagnosis, monitoring, treatment and cure.

This is the reason the European Parliament Interest Group on Innovation in Health and Social Care was created.