The mission of the European Respiratory Society (ERS) is to promote respiratory health in Europe in order to alleviate suffering from respiratory disease. This is accomplished by promoting basic epidemiological and clinical respiratory research, collecting and disseminating scientific information, organising congresses and conferences, producing scientific publications, supporting training and continuous education in respiratory medicine, and collaborating with organisations that represent patients.
However, to successfully reach its mission the ERS also needs to focus on developing a sustainable advocacy strategy, directed at national and European policy and decision makers who set the political agenda, be it in education, research or public health. Policy interventions are a necessity if the growing trend of suffering and death from respiratory diseases is to be reversed. Therefore, the ERS launched a campaign at European Union (EU) level to inform decision makers about these diseases, as well as to gain their support and the commitment required to drive through change at policy level.
Respiratory diseases have a huge impact across Europe for patients and in the utilisation of healthcare resources in terms of medication, hospital admissions, lost working days and anticipated mortality. The European Lung White Book 1, published by the ERS and the European Lung Foundation (ELF), represents the first comprehensive survey to raise public awareness and inform decision makers on the burden to society caused by lung diseases, including epidemiological data, but also environmental risk factors and the socioeconomic costs.
On a global level, the World Health Organization (WHO) has included chronic respiratory disorders as one of the main chronic diseases causing death in the 2005 global report “Preventing chronic diseases: a vital investment” 2. Moreover, the WHO recently called for extra efforts in prevention, early diagnosis and treatment of such diseases, which could save 36 million lives worldwide by 2015 2 …
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