BRUSSELS, September 18 2012:

Today, Nessa Childers, MEP hosted the launch of the Manifesto of the European Alliance for Personalised Medicine in the European Parliament. 

The Manifesto sets out both the opportunities and challenges of ‘a targeted approach to the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of disease based on an individual’s specific profile’ - what is known as personalised medicine.

Currently available treatments for disease have revolutionised health in Europe and beyond, but science has now brought healthcare to the brink of another major evolution.

By a combination of molecular medicine and computer technology, it is becoming possible for screening of patients, early treatment, or prevention to be calibrated precisely, to deliver with maximum effectiveness. With personalised medicine, healthcare services will ensure the right intervention to the right patient at the right time - improving patient outcomes, reducing the likelihood of adverse events, and cutting down unnecessary treatments.

In an effort to mitigate shortages of hematologic drugs in Europe, EHA is collecting and compiling reports of shortages.

THE HAGUE – July 18, 2012 – Replacing the current Clinical Trials Directive, the European Commission (EC) adopted a proposal yesterday to regulate medical research in Europe.
It appears that the Commission has taken to heart many of the criticisms voiced by EHA and other stakeholders and is now proposing to reduce red tape through the introduction of a regulation, rather than a directive. This should simplify the application for market authorization of medicines and ensure procedural coherence of the assessment.

AMSTERDAM – June 16, 2012 –The European Hematology Association (EHA), the American Society of Hematology (ASH), and the European Cancer Patient Coalition (ECPC) joined today in issuing a common call to action in an effort to mitigate shortages of hematologic drugs in Europe, the United States and around the world. The collective made the announcement today following the EHA-ASH Joint Symposium at the 17th EHA Congress in Amsterdam which was dedicated to the drug shortage crisis.

Laurent Degos will be the fifth recipient of the Jean Bernard Lifetime Achievement Award which was presented for the first time at the 13th Congress in Copenhagen. This award was established to honor outstanding physicians and scientists for their lifetime contribution to the advancement of hematology.

The EHA Board has selected Professor Jesús San Miguel for the José Carreras Lecture at the 17th Congress in Amsterdam. Jesús San Miguel is Professor of Medicine (Haematology), Head of the Hematology Department at the University Hospital of Salamanca, and Director of the Biomedical Research Institute of Salamanca, Spain. He is an internationally recognized leader in the field of hematology, and specifically in the area of multiple myeloma.

Amsterdam, June 15, 2012. “There is a large potential opportunity for saving lives by early identification of cardiac iron loading in Thalassemia patients”, declares Professor John-Paul Carpenter of the Royal Brompton CMR Unit in London at the 17th Congress of the European Hematology Association in Amsterdam.

Amsterdam, June 15, 2012. At the 17th Congress of the European Hematology Association in Amsterdam Professor Max Topp of the University of Wuerzberg in Germany presents the impressive results with a bispecific antibody for Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia patients.

Amsterdam, June 15, 2012. Dr Micheal Hedenus of the Haematology Unit of the Sundsval Hospital in Sweden will present promising results on a study on a single iron dose for fatigue treatment in iron deficient women at the 17th Congress of the European Hematology Association in Amsterdam.

Amsterdam, June 15, 2012. Dr Alan Ramsay will present findings of a study in patients with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia that will contribute to the design of immunotherapeutic strategies leading to the killing of cancer cells at the 17th Congress of the European Hematology Association in Amsterdam.

Amsterdam, June 15, 2012. “Hodgkin lymphoma has become one of the most curable malignancies in adults,” was stated by Dr Andreas Engert, Professor of Hematology at the University Hospital of Cologne in Germany. Results of the German Hodgkin Study Group (GHSG) HD 15 trial are presented at the 17th Congress of the European Hematology Association in Amsterdam.

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has launched a new Call for Expressions of Interest for Drug Safety Studies with a view to drawing up a list of potential contractors who may be invited to reply to specific invitations to tender in the future.

An article in the New England Journal of Medicine in January entitled ‘Selling Bone Marrow-Flynn v. Holder by Glen Cohen¹ reports on a disturbing development in the USA. Cohen reviews a recent judgment by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit which held that a ban on selling ‘bone marrow,’ that is part of the National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA) of 1984,² does not encompass ‘peripheral blood stem cells’. The judgment, according to Cohen, is based on the statutory interpretation of NOTA, not on the plaintiff’s more radical claim that the prohibition on selling bone marrow violates the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

In their Reflection paper on risk based management in clinical trials the European Medicines Agency (EMA) is aiming to describe the concept of risk based quality management in the setting of clinical research.

EHA and the European Cancer Patient Coalition co-hosted a meeting at the European Parliament in Brussels on August 30-31, 2011.