"The lives of many patients, especially children, are in danger. In consequence, the European Commission must now act very urgently," demanded CDU MEP Peter Liese on the occasion of the meeting of European Health Ministers on Friday and the increasing supply shortages of medical devices such as cardiac catheters for children.
Liese, who used to work in a children's hospital, reported, "My colleagues, especially from pediatric cardiology and pediatric surgery, warn that many products are already in short supply and that they can no longer treat children according to the latest medical standards. For them, every day counts. After my letter to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides many months ago, the Environment and Health Committee as a whole has now joined me and composed a text to the Commission. Although the European Commission has some ideas on how to tackle the problem, it does not yet want to present a concrete legislative proposal but wants to first discuss it with the health ministers. I find this unacceptable. This proposal must be put forward as soon as possible. I will then work to ensure that a proposal with a real solution to the problem is quickly adopted in the European Parliament."
Experts from CDU/CSU, science and industry called for a stronger commitment of the European Union and the Member States to so-called negative emissions, or technologies to remove CO2 from the atmosphere. In this respect, they generally welcome a proposal of the European Commission on a certification framework for carbon removal, which is expected for tomorrow, Wednesday. In a video conference, Peter Liese, the EPP Group’s Spokesman on Environment; Andreas Jung, the CDU/CSU Group’s Deputy Chair and Spokesman for climate and energy in the German Bundestag; Peter Jahr, the EPP shadow for agriculture, as well as Felix Schenuit, German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) & CDRterra and Anastasios Perimenis, Secretary General of CO2 Value Europe, commented on the expected Commission proposal.
“The European Parliament, the Council of Ministers represented by the Czech Presidency and the European Commission agreed preliminarily on the conditions on how to include maritime emissions in the EU ETS during the so-called trilogue late Tuesday evening. This agreement is called ‘historic’ by some because for more than ten years the European Parliament, many experts, in particular from the environmental field, many member states and the Commission pushed for this inclusion.
Now it is close to a formal agreement. As proposed by the Commission, not only trips inside the EU but also trips from EU port to third countries and for third countries to EU port (50%) will be included.
“A final agreement on including maritime in the EU ETS is in reach if all sides show good will.”, comments the EP rapporteur on the file, Peter Liese, after a trilogue on ETS that was focussing on the inclusion of ETS maritime. “The effect of the inclusion of maritime alone would be significantly bigger than other parts of the Fit-for-55 legislation for example CO2 cars.