Letter to Members, Observers and Sister Fora
EuroPharm Forum News April 2009
Dear Colleagues and Friends
I would like to personally invite you to come to the Consultation meeting of the EuroPharm Forum to put your fingerprint on its future. This one-day event will be most important in setting the frames and shaping the very objectives of the organisation, and we are happy to see that registration for the meeting is growing.
It is very important for the Executive Committee that we hear your voice, since you decide about the Forum. During the Consultation, we will provide you with our picture of the Forum in the near future. The main colours of this picture will be about:
We will welcome your suggestions for additional themes, as mentioned in the
2nd Announcement of the Consultation.
After having provided you with the situation as seen by the Executive Committee, you will be called upon, delegation by delegation, to speak, to give your comments, suggestions and, hopefully, also your support. Some areas of the picture will most certainly need more discussion; we will identify these and spend extra time to discuss them. At the end of the day, we will conclude for the next steps.
The main outcome that we need from this Consultation is your answer to this question: Do you want us to continue to develop the future of the Forum, or should we prepare closure of the Forum? The Consultation may reveal another alternative to these two options.
The Executive Committee is very open to all suggestions, and we are looking forward to the Consultation with an open mind and a positive spirit.
When we left Copenhagen, following the General Assembly in October, the horizon of the Forum looked dark and grey. Since, we have met with a number of our members and observers, and the horizon is becoming more colourful; maybe we will come to the conclusion that spring is coming again.
On 27 March 2009, Dr Nata Menabde (WHO Deputy Regional Director for Europe) and I signed a
Memorandum of Understanding for Collaboration. This marks the important basis for further collaboration between WHO Europe and the Forum. Dr Menabde strongly supports the initiatives of the Forum, and I am very confident that we have a healthy basis for further and broader development of the professional work in line with WHO and EuroPharm Forum policies. Please feel free to use the
press release to inform your professional partners of this important development in the relationship with WHO Europe.
Ten days ago, the Executive Committee and the professional advisors of the Forum (i.e. Programme Co-ordinators and Working Group Moderators) met in Hillerød. The meeting was very fruitful, and we had a very good and open debate on the future way of working in the Forum. The professional advisory board had the following suggestions for the future work:
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Focus on a smaller number of domains, in accordance with members' wishes
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For a limited period of time, eg 6 months, dedicate all resources to one domain
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A two-stringed way of working, where the Forum opens up the discussion of professional domains to all interested parties for their contribution on an open-space (wiki-based) website while keeping the internal production of reports, analyses, etc. restricted to the members-only space on the Discussion Fora, but for subsequent dissemination of these reports on the wiki site. This should make it interesting for experts to join in the discussions and will increase the amount of input and national examples to the Working Groups.
These and more ideas will be discussed further in the Consultation on 26 May at the WHO in Copenhagen.
The Executive Committee looks forward to seeing you there.
Dick Tromp
President, EuroPharm Forum
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