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This Friday, Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee (IMCO) member, Jordi Cañas, asked the European Commission to take measures to ensure that Member States do not prevent exports of medical material essential for treating coronavirus within the Community market.
The Citizens’ MEP criticised the fact that, while the Community executive is working through the “Coronavirus response team” to tackle the COVID-19 virus, “some Member States are banning intra-Community exports of respiratory assistance devices, masks and viral protection equipment”.
“The Commission plans to jointly purchase medical response products, but this is not enough. National health systems face many difficulties in accessing supplies of medical equipment and medical supplies essential for the prevention, diagnosis and proper treatment of the virus”, Mr. Cañas said.
He stressed that the lack of health product supplies and the impossibility for the population to access them is an added risk to preventing spread. “The European institutions must avoid the fragmentation of the internal market“, he added, stressing that “solidarity between Member States has always been an essential EU value.
Mr Cañas also asked the Commission if it “intends to assume direct action capacity in the face of global emergencies and crises through a European emergency management and response mechanism”.
The MEP from Renew Europe pointed out that the Citizens’ Delegation in Europe has proposed the creation of a common European health response protocol for the coronavirus which, through the European Emergency Response Coordination Centre (EERC), could issue health recommendations to be applied systematically in Member States.
“The World Health Organisation (WHO) has classified COVID-19 as a pandemic”, stressed Mr Cañas, “and this implies that the European institutions must take a proactive role in mitigating the spread of the virus. The IMCO member concluded by saying that “Europe and all its institutions have a lot at stake in the management of the Coronavirus crisis. This time they must live up to the expectations of their citizens. They must be able to show that in the face of threats we need more Union, we need more Europe”.