What does it mean when your treatment is in shortage? For people living with asthma, allergy, COPD and atopic eczema, it means anxiety, disrupted care and uncertainty. EFA joined the European Medicines Agency’s first-ever public webinar on medicine shortages, where our President Marcia Podestà shared examples from our community, including salbutamol and auto-injector shortages. Together with EU institutions, patient and consumer organisations, we discussed how Europe can secure access, transparency, continuity of care and patient organisation involvement.

EFA has submitted input to the European Commission’s consultation on the EU Biotech Act, part of its Life Sciences Strategy. Our priorities: faster access to proven biotech, with safety, transparency and affordability protected. We call for clearer, predictable regulation, early involvement of patient organisations, resilient EU manufacturing to prevent shortages, and sustained investment in research, skills and trusted data use. Thank you to the EFA community of members for their contributions to this consultation.

EFA has submitted a community-driven response to the European Commission’s call for evidence on the revision of the Medical Devices and In Vitro Diagnostics Regulations (MDR/IVDR). We set out recommendations to ensure devices such as inhalers, nebulisers and diagnostics are safe, affordable and reliably available across countries. Our asks: clearer and more consistent EU rules, better alignment with the Health Technology Assessment Regulation, and meaningful involvement of patient organisations in decisions that shape access to medical devices.

To mark World COPD Day 2025, we launched the Travel with Oxygen toolkit, co-developed with our COPD working group, to help people who need supplementary oxygen stay mobile, safe and confident when travelling across Europe. The toolkit includes a pre-travel checklist, email templates and a network of EFA National Contact Points (NCPs) in France, Germany, Iceland, Italy and Spain.

Explore the toolkit below, link to it from your travel advice and make it available to your communities.

EFA responded to WHO’s survey on implementing the WHA Resolution on Skin Diseases, contributing to a future Global Action Plan. We focused on atopic eczema, highlighting its high prevalence in children and its emotional, social and economic burden. We flagged misconceptions, underdiagnosis, out-of-pocket costs and lack of multidisciplinary care, and called for action including integrating AE into Healthier Together, an EU Joint Action on AE, a WHO/Europe Regional Action Plan and stronger national policies.

EFA has responded to the European Commission’s consultation on the Affordable Housing Plan with a clear message: housing policy is health policy. Indoor air quality, ventilation and heating systems, insulation and building materials all directly affect respiratory health. We call for health-based renovations, better information on indoor air quality, robust HVAC standards in social housing and research that includes vulnerable groups. We also urge cross-sector dialogue to share good practices across Europe.Thank you to our members for their valuable input!

EFA took part in the Annual Stakeholder Forum of the EU-funded Partnership for the Assessment of Risk from Chemicals (PARC), together with our Polish member Prof. Artur Badyda and Senior Policy Advisor Panagiotis Chaslaridis. Discussions focused on PARCopedia, PARC’s online knowledge platform on chemical risk assessment. We highlighted the need to make PARCopedia more accessible for non-scientists.