Posėdžio stenograma

Pirmadienis, 2006 m. gruodžio 11 d. - Strasbūras

16. Traumų prevencija ir saugumo skatinimas (diskusijos)

  Presidente. Segue-se o relatório da Deputada Kathy Sinnott, em nome da Comissão do Ambiente, da Saúde Pública e da Segurança Alimentar, sobre uma proposta de recomendação do Conselho sobre a prevenção de lesões e a promoção da segurança [COM(2006)0329 - C6-0238/2006 - 2006/0106(CNS)] (A6-0398/2006).

  Markos Kyprianou, Member of the Commission. Mr President, may I first express my thanks for all the hard work done by the members of the committees concerned with the Commission’s proposal for a Council recommendation on the prevention of injury and the promotion of safety. Let me acknowledge in particular the effort made by Mrs Sinnott in respect of this important initiative. I should also like to express my thanks to the Austrian Presidency for hosting a conference during its term, which also contributed to this issue.

The Commission started to support actions in the area of injury prevention under the former EU programme on injury prevention and has continued its support under the current public health programme. Injuries represent, as you know, after cardiovascular disease, cancer and respiratory diseases, the fourth most common cause of death in the Member States. Every year, some 235 000 EU citizens die as a result of an accident or violence. Over 50 million citizens seek medical treatment for injuries and 6.8 million of those are admitted to hospital. Injuries, unintentional and intentional, are estimated to be the main cause of chronic disability in young people, leading to an enormous loss of life-years in good health. Among people over 65, accidents and injuries are also a major cause of death and disability and are often the trigger for a fatal deterioration in health.

Areas that have attracted less attention in the past include home, leisure and sports accidents, as well as accidents in vulnerable population groups, such as children, adolescents and elderly people. Research shows that more than 50 % of serious accidents are preventable and that reduction by one quarter should be a realistic target over the next 10 years. But, of course, it is of the utmost importance to have reliable information on injuries in Europe in order to plan actions. Injury information is also essential for evaluating the outcome of all our efforts and actions.

The Commission has set out a Community action plan on injury prevention and safety promotion in its communication ‘Action for a Safer Europe’. Member States are encouraged to create similar national plans for injury prevention. Such plans should serve as a framework for actions that engage relevant partners and stakeholders. They should define institutional responsibilities and should be based on good practice and safety promotion.

The Council recommendation on the prevention of injury and the promotion of safety is a first step towards combining the efforts of the Commission with those of the Member States for actions for a safer Europe, in order to reduce the individual and societal burden of injuries. Through such a joint approach, through learning from each other’s experiences, we can have faster and more effective results. We hope and expect that the situation within the Member States in relation to accidents and injuries will improve significantly in years to come.

Once again, I would like to thank the rapporteur and the committee. I am looking forward to a very interesting debate.

  Kathy Sinnott (IND/DEM), rapporteur. – Mr President, injuries can take or change a life in a split second. They can be accidental, inflicted or self-inflicted. Injuries cause the death of a quarter of a million people and result in 65 hospital admissions every year. The challenge, when dealing with something as widespread, serious and preventable as injury, is to save lives and preserve health. For that reason I felt both challenged and privileged to work on this report.

In this report, which particularly focuses on injury data collection, I have recommended that to promote safety and prevent injury we need better-quality data. It is not helpful in terms of prevention to know the overall number of road fatalities. We need to know what it was that made the fatal difference. Was it the condition or type of vehicle; was the victim the driver, a passenger or someone walking along the road; were drink, speed or bad weather conditions involved; what was the road like? That is the type of breakdown we need in every area of injury if we are going to save lives. We cannot hope to closely examine every injury but we should and must create a system of data collection that more closely examines the injury determinants of all fatal and seriously disabling injuries, to prevent them more effectively in the future.

That is my approach in the report, which the Committee on Environment, Public Health and Food Safety strongly supported. Gathering such information may seem difficult, but in reality a great deal of information is already in place: insurance companies have detailed data on accidents; police have data on violent and self-inflicted harm. We must identify the experts in injury reporting and work with them to get the information that can be studied to truly prevent injuries and promote safety.

The Commission document allowed the injury and safety surveillance system a place within all future health programmes. That would surely allow the system funding, regardless of whether it proved effective or beneficial. We feel strongly that a real initiative to prevent injury and promote safety is so important that it needs to be put on its own stream within the health programmes. We need to think about that again in more detail when we consider the health programmes themselves. That means that this particular recommendation should not yet be linked to the health programmes but should be considered alongside them. That is why the Committee on the Environment took out all mention of health programmes from the document.

The Commission laid out seven priorities to which we have added injury and safety in the workplace, and we have also stressed domestic violence among women and children. One change I ask that we make is to take out Amendment 4, which we will vote on separately tomorrow. That suggests: ‘Domestic violence against women is the main cause of death and invalidity among women between the ages of 16 and 44.’ Domestic violence against women and children is clearly a crime and I strongly support amendments that have highlighted that. However, a recommendation to produce higher-quality data cannot itself include inaccurate data. The statistic this amendment presents on the main cause of death is inaccurate. As recently as October a Eurostat publication said that transport accidents and suicide were the main causes of death of women in that age group.

Because we want to make injury surveillance more comprehensive we include mention of risk-taking behaviour, drugs and alcohol, gender considerations, social and environmental condition. Self-harm is also emphasised because of its increasing incidence. We have also made additions to the list of high-risk groups to include the young, the elderly, disabled people and women. The list is not exhaustive.

I support the amendments on needle-stick injuries and injuries to healthcare workers. We know the solution to them. They are easily preventable and therefore completely inexcusable.

It is clear that injury places a heavy burden on the economy. For me, however, it is a question of injured people and their families. In my opinion, the real key to preventing injury and promoting safety is the value we place on the human person. If you have a Renaissance masterpiece you handle it with far more care than a magazine poster. We need to return again to people and their value as the central issue.

Some injuries will happen – we cannot prevent them all – but with better understanding of how they happen, resulting in safer products and practices, we can reduce their occurrence. However, we will not have a serious effect on the level of injury until people realise that every person matters and that the loss or disablement of even one person is a great loss to us all. When we understand that, we will treat each other and ourselves like the masterpiece that we are and we will realise our shared responsibility for each other’s safety. That is what is behind Amendment 21 and why I emphasise to the Commission that the tragedy of injury is so much more than the economic burden.

  Αντώνιος Τρακατέλλης, εξ ονόματος της ομάδας PPE-DE. – Κύριε Πρόεδρε, είχα την τιμή πριν από οκτώ περίπου χρόνια να είμαι ο εισηγητής στο πρόγραμμα για την πρόληψη των τραυματισμών στον ελεύθερο χρόνο και είχα εντυπωσιαστεί πραγματικά την εποχή εκείνη από τον τεράστιο αριθμό αυτών των τραυματισμών, ο οποίος έδειχνε ότι έχουμε ένα πολύ μεγάλο πρόβλημα.

Θα ήθελα να πω ότι η έκθεση την οποία υπέβαλε η συνάδελφος, κ. Sinnott, είναι πάρα πολύ καλή και προς την κατεύθυνση αυτή βοήθησα - και με δικές μου τροπολογίες - ώστε, εφόσον μελλοντικά υπάρξει ένας κοινοτικός μηχανισμός «επιχείρηση καταγραφής των τραυματισμών», να συνεργεί στην ανάπτυξη εθνικών πολιτικών πρόληψης, διότι η συστηματική συλλογή των δεδομένων θα αποκαλύψει και τα αίτια των τραυματισμών, δηλαδή αυτό που λέμε τους καθοριστικούς παράγοντες των τραυματισμών. Θεωρώ ότι οι κυριότεροι τομείς - τους οποίους ανέφερε ήδη η εισηγήτρια - πρέπει να συνδεθούν αποκλειστικά με την αποτελεσματικότητα της πρόληψης των ατυχημάτων, θα έλεγα δε ότι πρέπει να εγκύψουμε ιδιαίτερα στο πρόβλημα των ηλικιωμένων, οι οποίοι αποτελούν μεγάλο μέρος των θυμάτων, να δούμε τα ατυχήματα τα οποία προέρχονται από τη βία εναντίον των γυναικών - πιστεύω ότι είναι αρκετά μεγάλος ο αριθμός - και βεβαίως τα ατυχήματα στους δρόμους, τα οδικά ατυχήματα δηλαδή, και τα ατυχήματα στον αθλητισμό καθώς και τα ατυχήματα που προκαλούνται από προϊόντα και υπηρεσίες.

Για τη μεγιστοποίηση της αποδοτικότητας και της μείωσης του κόστους κρίνω αναγκαία την ενσωμάτωση των υφιστάμενων προγραμμάτων και υποδομών (τράπεζες δεδομένων κλπ.), διότι η Επιτροπή είχε ήδη προγράμματα σε αυτό το θέμα, επομένως υπάρχουν δεδομένα που θα πρέπει να λάβει υπόψη της, όταν θα συντάσσει την πρότασή της προς το Κοινοβούλιο. Ο μηχανισμός θα συγκεντρώνει στοιχεία που θα παρέχουν τα κράτη μέλη βάσει εθνικών συστημάτων επιτήρησης των τραυματισμών, επιτρέποντας την εύκολη πρόσβαση σε πληροφορίες και ορθές πρακτικές.

Κυρίες και κύριοι, κλείνω λέγοντας ότι οι χιλιάδες θάνατοι και μαζί η οικονομική αιμορραγία που προκαλούν οι τραυματισμοί είναι μια ανοικτή πληγή για τις ευρωπαϊκές κοινωνίες. Δεν κλείνει εύκολα, όμως μπορούμε να δημιουργήσουμε μελλοντικά έναν κοινοτικό μηχανισμό συλλογής δεδομένων που θα μας βοηθήσει στην αποτελεσματική πρόληψη αυτών των τραυματισμών.

  Edite Estrela, em nome do Grupo PSE. – Senhor Presidente, caros Colegas, os números revelam que é necessário alertar os cidadãos para as consequências de comportamentos de risco. Quantos acidentes viários não são causados pelo alcoolismo ou pelo consumo de drogas? E quantas lesões graves de crianças não resultam da falta de cuidado por parte dos adultos? A ingestão de produtos tóxicos, por exemplo, como detergentes ou medicamentos? Anualmente cerca de 235.000 cidadãos europeus morrem na sequência de lesões resultantes de acidentes ou da violência, o que representa mais de 600.000 vítimas mortais por dia só na União Europeia. São números assustadores pelo que representam de sofrimento e dramas pessoais, mas também pelos custos sociais e orçamentais.

É um facto: os acidentes e as lesões representam enormes custos humanos, a morte prematura e anos de vida com incapacidade, mas também elevados custos ao nível dos cuidados de saúde e de prejuízos para a sociedade devido à perda de produtividade. As lesões podem, no entanto, ser evitadas. Para isso é indispensável adoptar estilos de vida mais saudáveis e tornar as condições de vida mais seguras. Mais vale prevenir que remediar.

O risco de lesões não está distribuído igualmente por todos os Estados-Membros nem por todos os grupos sociais. Os factores de risco são determinados também pelo próprio ambiente doméstico e de trabalho. A idade e o género devem igualmente ser tidos em consideração. Por isso apresentei uma proposta de alteração para que a perspectiva do género seja integrada em todas as áreas, incluindo as políticas de saúde. Para tal é necessário realizar estudos quantitativos baseados no género e afectar recursos aplicando o princípio da orçamentação em função do género porque, já aqui foi dito, a violência doméstica, a violência contra as mulheres é também uma causa importante de lesões que são, em primeiro lugar, graves para as mulheres mas também para toda a sociedade.

  Marios Matsakis, on behalf of the ALDE Group. – Mr President, Commissioner, firstly I wish to congratulate Mrs Sinnott on her excellent report, which deserves our full support. The subject matter of this draft legislative resolution is undoubtedly extremely important, as it concerns the premature deaths of more than 200 000 EU citizens annually and the injury of several million individuals in the 25 Member States. Some of these injuries are horrific, and many result in the permanent disfigurement or severe lifelong disability of thousands of people.

Two main aspects of the prevention of accidental injury are: the identification and assessment of risks factors, and the proper communication and implementation of safety measures. Mrs Sinnott correctly notes that, in addition to the gathering of information on injuries by way of establishing a surveillance system, the Council’s report needs to be enriched by placing more emphasis on the promotion of safety and raising risk-awareness among the general public. Of the numerous serious risk factors affecting human life, allow me to concentrate on just one: alcohol and road safety.

In this area, there is much to be done in terms of prevention. The use of alcohol by drivers is extremely dangerous, mainly because alcohol suppresses our higher-level brain function, resulting in impairment of sense perception, slowness of reflexes, disturbance of locomotor muscle coordination and poor understanding of danger. In this respect, alcohol has, through the years, been responsible for the deaths of millions of road users worldwide. Yet, either because of ignorance, or more likely as a result of very strong lobbying by the alcohol industry, we fail to comprehend fully that much more drastic action on drink-driving is necessary. Instead, we are led to believe that alcohol intake is safe below certain limits, i.e. 50 mg per 100 ml of blood in most EU countries.

This is totally wrong in my view. There is no safe limit for alcohol and driving. Any alcohol intake, however small, will affect brain activity to some extent. Whereas a driver with a blood alcohol level of 20, 30 or 40 mg/100 ml might be legally entitled to drive, he or she is at a much higher risk of being involved in an accident than someone without any alcohol in their blood at all.

Our state education systems, as well as our legal systems, give our drivers a false sense of security in allowing them to think that, as long as they do not drink excessively, they are safe on the roads. This is criminally wrong and we must correct this situation by helping to bring about a zero-alcohol-level approach for drivers. Only then can we hope to reduce significantly the number of alcohol-related road deaths. But – and unfortunately there is always a ‘but’ in politics – how many of us are willing and able to take on the task of fighting for no-alcohol intake legislation for drivers, and how many of us will survive politically if we come into direct conflict with the alcohol-related industries by supporting a zero-alcohol level for drivers?

In conclusion, if there is an important injury-prevention message for our people this Christmas, it is that alcohol is a killer on the roads, in large as well as small quantities, and that the only safe driving alcohol level is a zero level.

  Irena Belohorská (NI). – Pripájam sa tiež k tým, ktorí podporujú odporúčania Rady a ďakujem spravodajkyni za vypracovanie správy Európskeho parlamentu k tejto otázke.

Základný dôvod k vypracovaniu tejto správy tu už bol dnes večer spomenutý niekoľko krát. Každý deň na následky úrazu alebo zranenia zomrie 600 ľudí, teda štvrť miliónov ročne. Tieto čísla vyjadrujú na jednej strane smútok a nešťastie rodín zo straty svojho blízkeho, na druhej strane musíme vidieť zo strany štátu aj veľkú ekonomickú záťaž, ktorú úrazy a násilie spôsobujú v oblasti sociálno-hospodárskej.

V mnohých členských štátoch musia nemocnice veľmi starostlivo zvažovať efektivitu liečby, napríklad pri onkologických ochoreniach, zatiaľ čo liečba úrazov a obetí násilia nás stojí veľké peniaze, a dá sa povedať, že v tomto prípade sa jedná o odvrátiteľné ochorenia. Každoročne v nemocniciach Európskej únie je prijatých 7 miliónov ľudí a až 65 miliónov ľudí si vyžaduje lekársku starostlivosť. Sú to teda štatistické čísla, ktoré vyjadrujú a predstavujú aj mimoriadne utrpenie všetkých postihnutých.

Z týchto dôvodov považujem navrhovaný spoločný postup členských štátov Európskej únie pri znižovaní počtu úrazov a násilia za veľmi efektívny. Kvalitná štatistika, ktorá bude rešpektovať aj rozdielnosti rôznych členských štátov nám pomôže presnejšie identifikovať spôsob, ako aj typ prevencie. Ak vieme, že ľudia starší ako 65 rokov predstavujú 16 % populácie Európskej únie, ale na smrteľných úrazoch sa podieľajú až 40 %, musíme viesť opakované informačné kampane, ktoré zameriame práve na tieto vekové kategórie, prípadne zavedieme ochranné režimy. Nemenej dôležitou skupinou, na ktorú sa musíme zamerať v prevencii úrazov a násilia, je práve mladá generácia. Veľmi často dochádza k úrazom pri športe pod dohľadom trénerov, prípadne aj v rámci aktivít voľného času. Musíme si vedieť vážiť svoje zdravie a zdravie ostatných a postaviť sa proti násiliu, ktoré sa na nás valí denne z televízie, filmov, ako aj detských hier a veľmi často je návodom na podobné správanie sa aj v spoločnosti.

  Horst Schnellhardt (PPE-DE). – Herr Präsident, meine Damen und Herren, Herr Kommissar! Die Bemühungen der Kommission, die hohe Zahl von Unfällen und Verletzten zu senken und die Situation in den Mitgliedstaaten signifikant zu verbessern, sind sicherlich begrüßenswert, und die Berichterstatterin hat ja auch einiges dazu gesagt. Aber glauben wir denn wirklich, dass mit diesen Maßnahmen die Unfälle in den Ländern seltener werden? Ich glaube, genau das Gegenteil wird der Fall sein. Wir binden mit diesen Maßnahmen Mittel in den Ländern, die genau für diese Maßnahmen eingesetzt werden können.

Ich will eine Bemerkung zu den Kosten machen, die immer aufgezählt werden. Natürlich beunruhigen mich die Zahl der Verletzten. Heute habe ich bei REACH gelesen, wie viel an Gesundheitskosten wir senken werden, wenn wir hier eine Verbesserung hinbekommen. Die Zahlen sind natürlich richtig, aber wir werden sie nicht erreichen. Das, was wir mit diesem Dokument erreichen, ist Bürokratie, obwohl wir alle schwören, dass wir Bürokratie in der Europäischen Union ablehnen und verringern wollen. Die Staaten in der Europäischen Union sind doch in dieser Problematik gut aufgestellt. Sie erheben ihre Statistiken, sie treffen die nötigen Maßnahmen, sie kennen die Situation vor Ort doch viel besser als wir in Brüssel oder Straßburg. Wenn wir uns einbilden, wir könnten durch unsere Statistiken den Mitgliedstaaten etwas Neues erzählen, dann gehen wir doch einen Irrweg. Das ist ein falscher Weg. Man kann doch nicht, wenn wir z.B. das Autofahren nehmen, hier von Brüssel aus das Verhalten der Autofahrer in Sizilien oder Finnland beeinflussen. Das kann man nur tun, indem man Maßnahmen vor Ort durchführt, und deswegen sind solche Maßnahmen nur in der Subsidiarität und nur dort zu regeln. Ich möchte das ein wenig übertrieben darstellen: Wenn Sie heute sagen, beim Gardinenaufhängen fallen viele Menschen von der Leiter und verletzen sich, dann kann man in einigen Staaten feststellen, dass – weil es dort traditionell keine Gardinen gibt, auch keine Unfälle zu verzeichnen sind. Wer will denn das noch vergleichen? So ist es mit vielen anderen Dingen auch. Ich denke also, wir gehen hier einen falschen Weg, wir sollten diese Maßnahmen noch einmal überdenken und uns auf bilaterale Maßnahmen konzentrieren, die wirklich zur Senkung von Unfällen führen. Mit diesem Vorschlag wird das aber nicht erreicht werden.

  Markos Kyprianou, Member of the Commission. Mr President, I would like to thank Members for a very interesting debate. I share with most of you the frustration we are facing that in the European Union we still have so many preventable causes of injury, death and ill-health, and that there is so much more we could do about it. I think these contributions are a step in the right direction and contribute to this effort. I know that the European Parliament has been consistently proactive on the subject of injury prevention, and today’s debate shows the interest in this issue.

For us, and me personally, the main target, the centre of my policies is the human being – people – and this is reality. But, in this day and age we also have to admit that unfortunately not all decision-makers have that as their sole consideration. So when we are able to accompany those arguments with financial and economic arguments, we can achieve this purpose even better. Without saying that these would be the priority or the main consideration, it does help. In addition to the human suffering, in addition to the pain, in addition to the social impact that injuries have, they also cause a serious problem for the economies of Member States and therefore investment from that point of view is also required.

Regarding the Commission’s position on the different amendments, the Commission can fully accept a large number of amendments, for example, 5, 18, 21, and partially accept amendments 7, 11, 15, 16 and 17. The full list of the Commission’s positions on each amendment is being made available to Parliament and I trust that it will be included in the record of this sitting⁽¹⁾.

We cannot accept the amendment that concerns the deletion of the financial mechanisms under the public health programme because we do not have any alternative, and on legal grounds we cannot accept an amendment that obtains support through the cohesion and structural funds. So, in the circumstances we will have to insist on maintaining the funding through the public health programme.

The main target of this proposal is of course the issue of information, because without the right information we will not be able to set the policies, we will not be able to set the targets, we will not know whether we are achieving our targets. Most Member States need help, and this can be shown from the results, from the information we have, and based both on the Treaty and the policies of complementing and supporting Member States in their efforts and also in coordinating the policy of Member States irrespective of policies, which is the reason for this proposal. It is true that there is information here and there, but we need to pull it all together so that we can learn from each other’s experiences and prove that this is a European Union of solidarity, a European Union of cooperation, where we can learn from each other’s experiences and help each other so that every single Member State does not have to go through this learning process at the cost of lives, at a cost to the health of European citizens. That is the challenge before us, and I think we can make great use of this possibility of an exchange of best practices and information and close cooperation. That is the target of this proposal, and I would like once again to thank Mrs Sinnott and Parliament for their support for our proposal.

  Presidente. O debate está encerrado.

A votação terá lugar na terça-feira, às 11h30.

Annex – Position of the Commission

Sinnott report (A6-0398/2006)

The Commission can accept Amendments 5, 18 and 21.

Amendments 7, 11, 15, 16 and 17 can be accepted in part.

The Commission cannot accept Amendments 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 and 30.

(1) Commission’s position on amendments by Parliament: see Annex.