Dr. Tony Holohan:

Obviously, I have been on the ECDC board for a short time over the Covid period. Each member state of the European Union has a position on the board and on the advisory council. We participate in that way. The ECDC mobilises a lot of the expertise of institutions around Europe. As I said in public before, one of the changes I have certainly noticed is the absence of the UK expertise. The UK is a large country, but in the space of public health, even as large country, it has always punched above its weight in terms of what it contributes to international thinking and capacity around management of public health. I have noticed the absence of that from the ECDC mechanisms, as I am quite sure colleagues around Europe have. We continue to dialogue through the different mechanisms that the ECDC has in place and we must not forget the Commission. The ECDC is not the only instrument that exists at Commission level to respond to pandemics. There is the Health Security Committee as well as all the formal political arrangements that exist between member states. The European Union is in the process of establishing, under a new board, and new entity called the European Health Emergency preparedness and Response Authority, HERA. It is about learning the lessons and applying, first of all, bigger budgets and stronger decision-making to measures that are taken as a community at a European level. The first emphasis in all of this is on co-ordinating on what are called "medical countermeasures". There is a board that is made up of members from each individual member state. I am the Irish representative as things stand. We are two meetings in and the next meeting of that organisation is due to take place early next week. We need to also factor that into our response capacity at a European level. Yes, the ECDC is an enormous organisation with a very high repute, and justifiably so. We always a keep close eye not just on what happens at the ECDC, but on what comes through the UK authorities, the CDC and the WHO. All of those kinds of things inform our responses. We are not in any sense dependent, if you like, on one source of guidance and advice. Yes, there are probably European lessons that can be learned about how we can mobilise expertise and guidance and advice quickly. There have been stages during a pandemic at which we have been very much assisted by the process of rapid risk assessments that the ECDC has in place. There is no question that on a few occasions, we would have liked to have had some of them sooner. That is not a criticism. I am quite sure, as Europe looks at the measures that can be taken to try to strengthen its own defence against pandemics like this, this will be part of its assessment, for the reasons the Deputy outlined.