In the past 90 years since their discovery, antibiotics have saved millions of lives from bacterial diseases. However, emerging resistance to antimicrobials now threatens many advances achieved in modern medicine. AMR is a critical global health issue tightly linked with the One Health concept, which recognises that human and animal health are inextricably linked, and that diseases are transmitted from humans to animals and vice versa. One Health also encompasses the environment as another link between humans and animals and a potential source and reservoir of AMR. Antimicrobial resistance is a growing global health concern and threatens the future treatment and health of humans and animals. In addition, AMR limits our ability to achieve several of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The global challenge to address AMR goes beyond the production of new antibiotics and therapies. Reducing demand for new antibiotics through public awareness, infection prevention and control, prudent and rational use of antibiotics for humans and animals, as well as effective diagnosis and surveillance of antibiotic-resistant infections and monitoring antibiotic use, are crucial when dealing with this problem globally. The transmission and spread of AMR in and between One Health compartments is complex, which emphasises the need for comprehensive interventions to reverse the trend of increasing human and animal infections resistant to treatment. The ERA-NET Cofund JPIAMR-ACTION will tackle this central challenge by supporting research and innovation for the development and testing of strategies and methodologies to reduce the transmission and spread of AMR within a full One Health spectrum. The JPIAMR-ACTION co-funded call and other activities will be instrumental in producing new innovative approaches, and advancing existing actions towards the development of new and improved interventions to inhibit or limit the development of AMR in humans, animals and the environment.

Digital health technologies (DHTs) are expected to improve both the quality and delivery of healthcare services for European societies while ensuring the sustainability of Europe`s healthcare systems. DHTs are also able to collect real-world data and evidence relevant for decision makers. However, the implementation of DHTs implies new methodological challenges to the standardisation of assessment criteria. Existing Health Technology Assessments (HTAs) are unable to capture the real added value of DHTs. EDiHTA will be the first flexible, inclusive, validated and ready-for-use European HTA framework reaching TRL 6-7, allowing the assessment of different DHTs (e.g. telemedicine, mApps, AI) at different TRLs, territorial levels (national, regional and local) and perspectives (e.g. payer, society, hospital). All relevant stakeholders will contribute to its design, development and validation. The digital framework will be piloted in real healthcare settings in 5 major European hospitals and through an open piloting scheme with European DHT developers. The principles of EDiHTA are to 1) promote a holistic approach involving all stakeholders for consensus building at national and European levels; 2) define a common terminology, harmonise and enrich existing HTA frameworks and create an open repository with frameworks, guides, articles and HTA methodologies; 3) optimise assessment processes along the DHT life cycle; 4) follow a multi-stakeholder, multi-domain and modular approach; 5) co-create EDiHTA solutions; and 6) provide a validated and ready-for-use digital HTA framework for DHTs. Next to leading academic groups in HTA research, our multidisciplinary consortium includes HTA agencies, clinics as DHT end-users, technology providers and a patient organisation with links to the broader European healthcare landscape of regulatory bodies, policymakers and payers. EDiHTA will leverage its network to accelerate the market entry of new DHTs for the benefit of European society.

Rare diseases (RD) are diseases that affect not more than 5 per 10 000 persons (according to the EU definition). 7000 distinct rare diseases exist, affecting between 6% and 8% of the population (about 30 million EU citizens). The lack of specific health policies for rare diseases and the scarcity of the expertise, translate into delayed diagnosis, few medicinal products and difficult access to care. That is why rare diseases are a prime example of a research area that strongly profits from coordination on a European scale. At present only few European countries fund research on rare diseases through specific dedicated programmes. Therefore, the funding of transnational collaborative research is the most effective joint activity to enhance the cooperation between scientists working on rare diseases in Europe and beyond. The E-Rare consortium was built to link responsible funding bodies that combine the scarce resources and fund rare disease research via Joint Transnational Calls (JTCs). The current E-Rare-3 pr

As recognized by the Council Recommendation 2009/C 151/02, rare diseases (RD) are a prime example of a research area that can strongly profit from coordination on a European and international scale. RD research should be improved to overcome fragmentation, leading to efficacious use of data and resources, faster scientific progress and competitiveness, and most importantly to decrease unnecessary hardship and prolonged suffering of RD patients. In the specific context of the massive generation, need for reuse and efficient interpretation of data, introduction of omics into care practice and the structuration of RD care centers in European Reference Networks, it appears crucial and timely to maximize the potential of already funded tools and programmes by supporting them further, scaling up, linking, and most importantly, adapting them to the needs of end-users through implementation tests in real settings. Such a concerted effort is necessary to develop a sustainable ecosystem allowing a virtuous circle between RD care, research and medical innovation. To achieve this goal, the European Joint Programme on RD (EJP RD) has two major objectives: (i) To improve the integration, the efficacy, the production and the social impact of research on RD through the development, demonstration and promotion of Europe/world-wide sharing of research and clinical data, materials, processes, knowledge and know-how; (ii) To implement and further develop an efficient model of financial support for all types of research on RD (fundamental, clinical, epidemiological, social, economic, health service) coupled with accelerated exploitation of research results for benefit of patients. To this end, the EJP RD actions will be organized within four major Pillars assisted by the central coordination: (P1): Funding of research; (P2): Coordinated access to data and services; (P3) Capacity building; (P4): Accelerated translation of research projects and improvement outcomes of clinical studies.