Plenary sessions Ljubljana 2018

The main theme of the 11^th EPH Conference Ljubljana 2018 is:

Winds of change: towards new ways of improving public health in Europe

This session is the official opening session of the conference. Prominent opinion leaders and policy makers from Slovenia will introduce the main themes of the conference.

Moderator

Ivan Erzen, Chair of the 11th European Public Health Conference

Keynote speakers

• • Samo Fakin, Minister of Health, Slovenia
  • Violeta Bulc, European Commissioner for Transport
  • Vytenis Andriukaitis, European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety (presentation)
  • Tomo Križnar, human rights activist, documentary filmmaker, journalist, worldwide traveller, Slovenia (presentation)

Background

Digital technologies have profoundly changed childhood and adolescence. Children and youth born since 1995 have grown up with internet, as an ever present feature in their lives.

Online access for many children is becoming more personal, more private and less supervised. Digital media and new technologies are changing children and youths’ lives and providing them with many new opportunities, but they can also pose challenges to their health and well-being.

Internet serves as a basis for digital media and new technologies to offer remarkable opportunities to engage and empower young people to drive change, and most children who are online view it as a positive experience. Digital technologies can also bring opportunities for learning, education, and employment.

In terms of health, e-mental health, for example, is a potential tool for prevention of mental health problems and for mental health promotion of children and adolescents. It can provide an anonymous, easily accessible forum for those hard to engage and it creates a platform for a forum of experiences and for prompt online intervention.

But there is also concern about the dangers of excessive on screen immersion. Time spent behind screens is contributing to more sedentary lifestyles and to growing levels of overweight and obesity. There are concerns about cyberbullying, child abuse, anxiety, gaming, and gambling. In addition, it is more difficult to put in place protections to keep youth from purchasing harmful products in the on-line world than in the real world.

Internet is also becoming increasingly commercialized, since the majority of digital media rely on business models centred on advertising. And online presence exposes children and youth to digital marketing.

Current knowledge and public health approaches are not adequately developed to address the challenges, benefits and impacts of digital technology on children and young people’s health. There is an absence of effective guidance and regulations of digital media in many countries. New ways of improving public health in Europe should define responses to the digital world of today and tomorrow.

Read the UNICEF report ‘A Child Rights-Based Approach to Food Marketing’ written by Amandine Garde (lead author) which presents a useful framework for delivering on the government obligation and business responsibility to protect children from unhealthy food marketing.

Moderator

Mojca Gabrijelčič Blenkuš, NIJZ, Slovenia and President EuroHealthNet

Keynote speakers

• Jeff Chester, Executive Director at the Center for Digital Democracy, Washington, USA (presentation)
• Martin Lennon, Children’s Commissioner for England, United Kingdom (presentation)
• João Breda, WHO European Office for the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases (presentation)

Panellists

• Uršula Mavrič, No Excuse, Slovenia
• Amandine Garde, Law & Non-Communicable Diseases Research Unit, University of Liverpool, United Kingdom (presentation)

Resources

• UNICEF. Children in a Digital World. The State of the World’s Children in 2017
• Twenge, Jean M. Have Smartphones Destroyed a Generation? The Atlantic, September 2017
• https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/sep/23/stress-anxiety-fuel-mental-health-crisis-girls-young-women
• COFACE policy brief on Connected Children: vulnerable users or digital experts? 2016:  http://www.coface-eu.org/consumers/policy-brief-connected-children/ies.
• The workshop, Digital Marketing to Children Methodological challenges for linking public health silos took place on 12 October 2017. See e.g.: http://www.eurohealthnet-magazine.eu/ehn-magazine-10/digital-marketing-to-children-a-new-public-health-challenge/
  WHO Europe. Tackling food marketing to children in a digital world: trans-disciplinary perspectives
• Children’s rights, evidence of impact, methodological challenges, regulatory options and policy implications for the WHO European Region. 2016 http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0017/322226/Tackling-food-marketing-children-digital-world-trans-disciplinary-perspectives-en.pdf
• From the Center for Digital Democracy in Washington:
  • On privacy and consumer protection issues arising from the use of health “wearable” devices, btw:  https://www.american.edu/media/news/20161215-montgomery-wearables-research.cfm
  • Digital fast food marketing and youth research: http://www.digitalads.org/how-youre-targeted/publications
  • Privacy complaint against YouTube for targeting children is https://www.democraticmedia.org/article/advocates-say-googles-youtube-violates-federal-childrens-privacy-law

Background

The Roadmap to implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, building on Health 2020, the European policy for health and well-being sets out five interdependent strategic directions:

• Advancing governance and leadership for health and well-being;
• Leaving no one behind;
• Preventing disease and addressing health determinants by promoting multi and intersectoral policies throughout the life-course;
• Establishing healthy places, settings and resilient communities;
• Strengthening health systems for universal health coverage.

This session takes place in the year 2030 and looks back at what has happened since 2018 to implement the SDGs successfully (using the 5 strategic directions as a framework).

What were the key decisions that were taken by policy-makers and which partnerships made it happen? What ways of working did we adopt and how did we manage the necessary changes?

Three professionals (representing an international health organization, a city council and a research institute) reflect on the year 2018 and how their work, in partnership with other sectors, has shaped the future we are now in.

The session will start with a welcome and framing by a moderator. Then presentations will follow: brief introduction to the European SDGs implementation roadmap, and three stories reflecting the actions in the year 2018 that shaped our future. A reflection from the key note listener is also planned.

Moderator

Anna Cichowska Myrup, Programme Manager Public Health Services, WHO Regional Office for Europe

Speakers/Panellists

• Bettina Menne, Coordinator Sustainable Development and Health, WHO Regional Office for Europe
• Charlotte Marchandise, Elected member of the City Council of Rennes, France
• Nancy Fullman, Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, Seattle, USA
• Hans Kluge, Director Health Systems and Public Health, WHO Regional Office for Europe

Background

Robust public health capacities and capabilities are essential elements in prevention and control of communicable diseases. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) assists the EU Member States to ‘have sufficient numbers of trained specialists […], and to have a capability to define health measures to control disease outbreaks’. ECDC also supports the implementation of Decision No. 1082/2013/EU, by providing technical advice and expert guidance aiming at strengthening public health emergency preparedness (PHEP) across the EU.

The logic model  for PHEP makes a distinction between capacities and capabilities. Capacities represent the resources – infrastructure, policies and procedures, knowledgeable and trained personnel – that a public health system has to draw upon. Capacities necessarily reflect variations in Member States’ government and private-sector organisations. Capabilities, on the other hand, describe what Member States are expected to achieve during an emergency, and can be described in a consistent way for all countries. Capacities and capabilities are both important for an effective emergency response; however, depending on the context, different kinds of capacities may be needed to achieve the required capabilities. (See http://bit.ly/2MIbCIu)

In the period 2014 – 2017, ECDC conducted a number of case studies to review public health preparedness in EU/EEA countries. Cases studies were built using a health threat (e.g. MERS-CoV, polio, Ebola and tick borne diseases) that could cause infectious disease outbreak and review focused, among other elements, on interoperability of plans between sectors and cross border aspect. In response to the Ebola outbreak, the Centre also visited three Member States with the aim to review their preparedness to respond to highly contagious haemorrhagic diseases. All assessed countries demonstrated to have a cadre of highly motivated and well-performing experts, even in settings where salaries have been severely cut.

With increasing urgency, developing and maintaining a well-trained and competent public health workforce, as an asset for the future of the public health, is becoming a clear priority. The trends affecting public health workforce demographics – including aspects linked to recruitment, retention and ageing of the workforce – call for policy attention to ensure that this particular public health asset does not get depleted. Other trends and new paradigms in public health, like big data and molecular diagnostics, call for a new generation of public health specialists with competencies relevant to the traditional as well as new facets of communicable disease prevention and control.

The aim of this one-hour session is to stir the debate around the essential public health capacities and capabilities needed to effectively address prevention and control of communicable diseases in the European context. The session will start with a keynote speaker, followed by a lively expert panel discussion reflecting different perspectives: policy, education and training, practice perspective, including an example of good practice.

Key question addressed:

How to ensure the development of competent and effective public health workforce able to address the issues related to emergency preparedness and response in times of new and evolving paradigms?

Moderators

Katarzyna Czabanowska, ASPHER, Karl Ekdahl, ECDC

Keynote speaker

Dame Anne Johnson, Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology, University College London, United Kingdom, Andrija Štampar Medallist 2018 (presentation)

Panellists

• Jeanette de Boer, ASPHER
• Usman Khan, Executive Director EHMA
• Dorit Nitzan, Coordinator, Health Emergency Information and Risk Assessment, WHO Health Emergencies Programme
• Wolfgang Philipp, Head of Unit Crisis Management and Preparedness in Health, DG SANTE, European Commission
• Svetla Tsolova, Senior Expert Monitoring and Evaluation, ECDC

Background

In a time of internet-research and twitter-truths, it becomes more and more important for the whole public health community to learn how to engage the public to support, participate in and make healthy choices. How can we raise the public’s awareness on public health challenges? How do we increase the impact of the messages we want to convey? How can and should we communicate so we have a larger impact of what we are trying to convey?

It is important that scientists – in this case public health scientists – learn how to communicate and work with politicians, journalists and citizens to get the right message across. In this plenary session, we are looking at this from different angles.

After an introduction to health communication and persuasion, a panel consisting of two scientists, a journalist and a policy-translator  will provide insight on how they have implemented ideas to raise the impact of public health messages and what they needed to implement these ideas. The two chairs of the session will then summarize the lessons learned in this session.

How to get our messages heard? – Aljoša Bagola, Pristop, Slovenia

If the end goal of creative endeavors in art is catharsis, then the end goal of creative endeavors in communication is effectiveness. Modern technology brings new possibilities and challenges for effective communication. With social media presence in every household and, through handheld devices, practically every pocket, an effective communication can reach very far. Even though messages delivered through social media are short and may seem to require relatively little preparation, they are, in reality, derived from a script that is extensive and well thought-out. During the presentation, strategies and techniques employed in social media advertising and possible implications for public health interventions will be discussed.

Moderator

Natasha Azzopardi Muscat, President EUPHA, and Isabel de la Mata, European Commission

Keynote speaker

Aljoša Bagola, Pristop, Slovenia

Panellists

• Carlo Signorelli, Italian Society of Hygiene, Preventive Medicine and Public Health, Italy
• Benedicte Carlsen, University of Bergen, Norway
• Christina Berndt, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Germany
• Jan Eyckmans, Ministry of Health, Belgium

Background

Europe is fully committed to achieving universal health coverage (UHC) – in principle. The European Union, the WHO Regional Office for Europe and their Member States support UHC as a core element of the Health Sustainable Development Goal 3. The WHO’s 2018 ministerial conference in Tallinn championed health inclusion, together with investment and innovation, as central guiding principles for health systems.

In practice, many European countries are still a long way from securing coverage, access and financial protection for everyone. Many of their people (including most particularly the poor and vulnerable populations, refugees and marginalized groups) still face substantial challenges:

• In seven EU countries more than 10% of low income people report unmet need;
• Out-of-pocket payments account for more than 15% of total expenditure in three out of four countries in the European region; and in one in three this rises to 30 % or more;
• In a quarter of countries, out-of-pocket payments are responsible for catastrophic expenditure in over 5% of households; with payment for medicines and inpatient care being the main cause of household impoverishment.

The plenary will explore the challenges of UHC. More than that, it will address the economic case for universal coverage – so both why financial protection helps avoid impoverishment, and why this matters. It will also show that better access is not just about improving levels of health or fairness or well-being but also about increasing economic productivity. It will offer evidence that may help reinforce the notional and principled commitment to universality and push it higher up the agenda of policy makers, including those in ministries of finance.

The keynotes and panelists are from academia, WHO EURO, the European Commission and senior policy making. They will lead a discussion of the evidence and policy strategies that can help Europe to reach the UHC 2030 target.

Moderator

Josep Figueras, European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies

Keynote speakers

• Rifat Atun, Professor Global Health Systems, Harvard University, USA
• Sarah Thomson, Senior Health Financing Specialist, WHO Barcelona Office for Health Systems Strengthening, WHO Regional Office for Europe

Panellists

• Isabel de la Mata, European Commission
• Clemens Martin Auer, Special Envoy for Health, Ministry of Health. President Health Forum Gastein, Austria
• Rifat Atun, Professor Global Health Systems, Harvard University, USA
• Sarah Thomson, Senior Health Financing Specialist, WHO Barcelona Office for Health Systems Strengthening, WHO Regional Office for Europe

Moderator

Ivan Erzen, Chair of the 11th European Public Health Conference

Keynote speakers

• Urban and Jasmina Praprotnik, pro-vaccine activists, Slovenia
• Eva Vrščaj, project IMMUNO, Slovenia

Awards ceremony

Best Poster Prize, Best Abstract Prize, Ferenc Bojan Award

Welcome to Marseille 2019

Yves Charpak, Chair of the 12th European Public Health Conference