EBA calls for more support to public plasma collections

EBA is one of the organisations behind a new campaign calling on national and European authorities for increased political support and funding for public plasma collection programmes. The new Commit to Plasma campaign has broad support from across the plasma supply chain and was developed together with patients, donors, physicians and other healthcare professionals, hospitals, healthcare services and public sector industry representatives.

In the current geopolitical context, dependency in the US for human plasma to manufacture medicines for EU patients is an unacceptable risk to EU citizens, in particular to the hundreds of thousands who depend on plasma-based medicines.

The organisations backing this campaign are therefore urging national authorities to jointly commit to an increase of public collection of plasma for fractionation in Europe by 40%, and at a minimum by 25%, by 2030. This would mean increasing the plasma contribution from Europe from 9 million litres in 2022 to at least 11 million litres in the next 5 years.

National authorities should commit to publishing National Plasma Plans by the end of 2026, with ambitious and clear commitments for national plasma collection goals, and earmark the resources required to achieve these goals. They should also improve national cooperation between the relevant stakeholders to help deliver these public programmes.

The manifest also calls on the European Commission, the European Parliament, as well as other relevant institutions such as Council of Europe’s European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines & HealthCare (EDQM), to support these efforts and work towards equipping Europe with a European Plasma Coordination Plan by 2027, building on the National Plasma plans. Europe needs more funding, more data and more exchange of best practices.

Visit www.committoplasma.eu to find out more and to endorse this important campaign.