December 17, 2019
IPOPI represents PLUS at EU Commission Conference on Blood Tissues and Cells
Following the publication of the Evaluation of the EU legislation on Blood, Tissues and Cells, the European Commission organised a conference in Brussels on October 28, 2019 to present the findings and give stakeholders an opportunity to discuss them.
The conference was open to all interested organisations and individuals and was attended by around 240 stakeholders from blood and tissue establishments, national authorities, patient and donor associations and industry.
Johan Prevot, IPOPI Executive Director and Steering Committee Member of the Platform of Plasma Protein Users (PLUS), took part in the session on “The challenge of achieving sufficiency and a sustainable supply to meet patient needs”. Mr Prevot spoke on behalf of PLUS to provide the perspective of patients relying on plasma derived medicinal products. In his presentation he highlighted that PLUS was calling for:
- Increased supply and free movement of safe and efficacious PDMPs developed on robust GMPs with the goal to meet patients’ growing needs
- Development of guidelines, policy and legislation should be based on facts and science/experience (not ideology)
- Safety of patients means global sufficiency based on regionally balanced plasma collection (each region has to do more, including the EU)
- Avoid wastage of plasma
- Develop or strengthen plasmapheresis programmes when possible, only way to increase plasma collection
- Encourage the co-existence of public & private plasma collection to face the needed investments and benefit from existent knowledge and experience
- Future EU legislation on PDMPs should be patient-centred
Mr Prevot observed that the EU has and continues to rely on US compensated plasma donors as well as compensated plasma donors from a limited number of EU member states. He called for the EU to look at best practise examples from those member states who have embraced systems that have allowed for a co-existence of the two sectors (public and private) and asked whether the EU was ready to equally encourage compensated plasma donations and voluntary unpaid blood and plasma collection to remedy to the current situation.
PLUS is committed to provide the patient perspective in all policy discussions around blood and plasma and access to PDMPs, as such PLUS is planning several initiatives including a stakeholders’ conference in January.
For more information on the conference and access to the presentations visit the dedicated EU Commission website.
