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1 month ago | 
politico.eu | Mari Eccles |Rory O’Neill |Giovanna Coi
The European Commission will stop hard-up health NGOs from accessing funding for lobbying or advocacy work because of the “reputational risk” to the European Union. The Commission — under pressure from right-wing lawmakers to push for more NGO funding transparency — already told green civil society organizations last year that they could no longer use EU funding to lobby the bloc’s institutions. Now it is saying the same to some health NGOs, many of which represent the interests of patients.
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Mar 11, 2025 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill |Helen Collis |Claudia Chiappa |Mari Eccles
Belgium was the architect of a European plan to tackle chronic drug shortages. But it views the EU's long-awaited fix announced Tuesday as a letdown. Even before the European Commission presented its Critical Medicines Act — which focuses on an overhaul of procurement rules and subsidies to boost domestic drugs production — the country's health minister lamented that the proposal “does not meet the gravity” of Europe’s supply crisis.
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Jan 7, 2025 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill
France has reported its first case of the new mpox variant, the county's public health agency announced today, bringing the total number of EU cases to eight. The individual, located in Brittany, had been in contact with two people who had recently returned from Central Africa. French authorities said they were working to identify all contacts. Sweden, Germany, Belgium and the U.K. have all reported cases, although there have been no major outbreaks outside Africa.
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Dec 5, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill
Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza, a landmark report from Amnesty International published Thursday concluded, the organization’s first such determination during an active armed conflict. The report, which analyzed interviews with 212 people, alongside satellite imagery, visual evidence and statements by Israeli officials, found Israel’s actions in the wake of the Oct.
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Nov 10, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill
LONDON — Of all the horrors that Manchester-based surgeon Ammar Darwish has seen in Gaza, one of the very worst is the trauma a year of Israeli bombardment has inflicted on the children. “It will go to their kids and to their grandkids … it does not go away,” he told POLITICO. On the wards of Gaza’s hospitals, Darwish saw children shivering at the sound of jets overhead. They know what that sound means.
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Nov 6, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill |Paula Andres
BRUSSELS — In some ways, it exceeded everyone's expectations. Olivér Várhelyi’s commissioner hearing was always going to be tough, but it turns out Viktor Orbán’s man in Brussels knew more about Europe’s health files than his CV suggested. He had done his homework. But while he mostly handled himself well in a room full of all-too-willing interlocutors, he failed to convince MEPs when pressed — again and again — on his support for abortion rights.
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Nov 5, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Paula Andres |Mari Eccles |Claudia Chiappa |Rory O’Neill |Bartosz Brzezinski
BRUSSELS — Hungary’s Olivér Várhelyi is hoping to win confirmation on Wednesday for another term as European commissioner. Having seen him in action over the last five years, however, European lawmakers have other ideas. As Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s man in Brussels, Várhelyi has served as enlargement commissioner since 2019 — earning a reputation along the way for unswerving loyalty to his controversial political patron and rudeness toward those who cross him.
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Nov 1, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill
Eight people are dead after the outdoor roof of a railway station collapsed in the Serbian town of Novi Sad on Friday, Interior Minister Ivica Dačić said. In a statement released by the Serbian government, Dačić said two people were injured and hospitalized, one of whom was in “very serious condition.” Dačić added that authorities are in contact with two people trapped under the rubble as they conduct a “very difficult” rescue operation.
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Nov 1, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill
Hundreds were involved in a shootout and brawl over drug trafficking that seriously injured five in the French city of Poitiers, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said Friday. What began as a shooting outside a restaurant on Thursday night descended into a massive a fight between rival gangs involving “between 400 and 600 people,” Retailleau told BFMTV/RMC radio, though BFM said it hadn’t yet been able to confirm the figures.
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Oct 31, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Rory O’Neill
H5N1 bird flu has been detected in a pig in the United States for the first time, U.S. authorities confirmed, raising concern it could increase the risk of infection to people. Pigs are considered a “mixing vessel” for flu viruses because they can harbor bird and human flu viruses at the same time, increasing the threat of a new hybrid strain that can more easily infect people.
