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The 21st NAT commission meeting will be held on 28 November 2018 in Brussels.

Exploratory debate:
Guillaume Cros was appointed rapporteur-general by CoR members during the October plenary session for the opinion on The reform of the CAP. During the NAT meeting there will be an explanatory debate with the participation of the Ms Esther Herranz Garcia, rapporteur on the Proposal for a Regulation establishing rules on support for strategic plans to be drawn up by Member States under the Common agricultural policy for the AGRI Committee at the European Parliament, and the opinion is foreseen to be adopted in the March plenary session.

The following draft opinion will be adopted:

Digitalisation in the health sector

(Rapporteur: Fernando LÓPEZ MIRAS (EPP/ES))

On 25 April, the European Commission adopted a communication on the digital transformation of health and care with the aim to promote health, prevent and control disease, help address the patients' unfulfilled needs and make it easier for citizens to have equal access to high quality care through the meaningful use of digital innovations.

• The Commission proposes EU action in the following areas:
  citizens' secure, cross-border access to their electronic health records and sharing of their records across borders;
• better, larger data sets through a shared European data infrastructure to promote research, prevent diseases and determine personalised medical treatment and care;
• provision of digital tools that enable citizens to manage their health more actively within integrated care systems.
  In many Member States, local and regional authorities are responsible for all or significant part of health and welfare policy and therefore have an important role in the development and digitalisation of health care.

Debate on Vaccines – protecting health, saving lives

Vaccination is one of the most cost-effective public health interventions. It protects health and saves lives of the most vulnerable members of society. Thanks to vaccination, diseases like smallpox or polio are now part of history and others like tetanus or diphtheria are almost unheard of in the European Union. Yet, despite all health and socio-economic benefits to individuals and society, there are groups of people across the Union who hesitate or simply reject vaccinations putting themselves and their children at risk. There are organised movements lobbying to make vaccination optional. There are also financial considerations and pressure on health budgets, especially when it comes to newly developed, expensive vaccines.

The NAT debate will address the issue focusing on vaccine hesitancy, sustainable vaccination policy across the EU and on EU support to national and regional vaccination plans.

Presentation of European Atlas of the Seas

European Atlas of the Seas – Presentation of new tools available for LRAs by EMODnet and European Commission's Directorate General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries – presentation by Chantal VANHOYE (DG MARE) and Pascal DERYCKE (EMODnet).

All documents related to the NAT commission meeting can be found here.

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