S&D and Renew trying to block collection of scientific data to fight COVID-19

"By voting against the proposal to urgently set up an EU data centre to collect all available Coronavirus data and to develop common standards for data collection, the Socialists and Liberals in the European Parliament have denied the European Union an extremely useful tool in the fight against the Coronavirus pandemic", said Christian Ehler MEP, the EPP Group’s Spokesman for Industry and Research.

They did so by voting against the inclusion of the proposal (amendment 13) in the European Parliament’s Resolution on EU-coordinated action to combat the COVID-19 pandemic and its consequences.

"The Coronavirus pandemic has - beyond any doubt - highlighted the need to create such an EU data centre for emergency response and analysis. It would include vital data relating to vaccines, treatments, allowing faster clinical uptake, to identify behavioural patterns, flows of people and vital products, and run predictive analytics. Moreover, with the use of Artificial Intelligence solutions we would be able to find quicker treatments and a cure", he continued.

As it stands today, Member States' data cannot be compared due to the lack of common standards. A common data standard would facilitate the exchange at EU level of research and health data between researchers and institutions that are working on the development of treatment and/or vaccines. "It goes without saying that any solution has to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation", concluded Ehler.