An initiative from the Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL) reminded us that the European Commission is considering to discontinue negotiations for the 2nd Environment and Health Action Plan for Europe (EHAP 2004-2010).

Here is a chance to express your views regarding the need for an political umbrella process that affects us directly (keeping us out of harm's way) and indirectly (helping to keep us in business as scientists/researchers in the field).

What does it mean when the research adequately underpins policies? What does it mean when there are no policies - what do we do with our research then? What issues get neglected if no research is conducted? What happens if the research does not have a user? What have we learned that we would not have known without the EHAP 2004-2010?
We encourage you to use this international platform to share your opinion. We would like to collect your thoughts and take the opportunity to present them at the 2nd European High Level Meeting on Research and Prevention, 8-10 November 2010 in Brussels, Belgium.

Thanks for your input!

As long as burden of diseases is not declining we should be interested to continue research on environmental health. Although many questions have been addressed in the last decades, the level of evidence of the gained knowledge is also an issue. Health indicators found by use of correlation studies are not necessarily significant when applied as an intervention in randomized trials and meta-analysis. Decreasing strength of evidence can be observed in more fields, like external safety, mite allergen avoidance and the use of external defibrillators by fire services. It is interesting to study – if feasible – whether environmental health indicators are robust at a higher level of evidence. And what should results mean for policies? May be limit the research to diseases with large economic impact?