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It’s been a busy 12 months in EU coverage land as lawmakers, leaders and officers raced to tie up free ends earlier than the European Parliament election subsequent June, with some efforts extra profitable than others.
The EU’s inexperienced ambitions grew to become the middle of a right-wing backlash because the real-life impression of proposed reforms began to chew. Europe’s drive for manufacturing self-sufficiency gained new political prominence, upending the bloc’s funds and competitors guidelines and reshaping the best way Europe thinks about commerce. And policymakers began to put out how they’ll govern new applied sciences, with an settlement on an AI act and new enforcement of the bloc’s digital guidelines.
However POLITICO’s crack staff of coverage journalists have additionally been beavering away on lots extra juicy scoops and insider takes that didn’t initially make it over the paywall. So, as a particular, extraordinarily nerdy, Christmas present for all of the coverage wonks on the market, right here’s a collection of our hottest articles.
The lobbying battle over setting new EU limits on a cancer-causing chemicalThis is the within story of the European Fee’s thwarted makes an attempt to dramatically decrease the authorized restrict for publicity to benzene — a chemical linked to elevated leukemia danger — after a marketing campaign from gas lobbyists. POLITICO acquired its arms on paperwork exhibiting how the lobbying course of went down and resulted in limits 10 instances increased than these really helpful by the European Chemical compounds Company’s scientific physique to make sure “no vital residual most cancers dangers.” Learn the story.
Pharmaceutical trade intervened in STOA reportAnother story of behind-the-scenes lobbying, this time involving two MEP lovers, an unbiased tutorial report and a multi-billion euro trade. Following a narrative by POLITICO on the mysterious disappearance of the report, which was important of the best way the pharma market works, the European Parliament confirmed that drug lobbyists had contacted MEPs to undermine the report’s credibility within the days earlier than it was pulled offline. We had the news first. Learn the story.
Fee proposes ports alliance to fight drug traffickingEurope has grow to be the world’s high marketplace for cocaine from Latin America, with ports in Rotterdam and Antwerp serving as main entry factors for the drug. 2023 was the 12 months when politicians began to take be aware and name for a Europe-wide technique to deal with the issue after standalone efforts to fight traffickers solely pushed the issue elsewhere. In October, the EU laid out its plan to strengthen its management over ports to deal with drug smuggling. Learn the story.
Made-in-hospital therapies in jeopardy as Parliament debates guidelines on new medicinesPatients within the EU affected by sure life-threatening cancers or immune issues, and for whom there isn’t a accessible remedy, can generally be given last-resort remedies which can be made in licensed hospitals from a affected person’s personal cells or tissues. These made-in-hospital therapies will be lifesaving, however in addition they don’t endure the same old checks for medicines. We checked out how this might change beneath the bloc’s proposed new medicines guidelines. Learn the story.
Fee falls brief on pledge to beat microplastic pollutionBy now we’ve all heard of microplastics — tiny plastic particles present in every little thing from cosmetics to detergents which can be more and more harming ecosystems and human well being. In its 2021 plan to deal with air pollution, the European Fee pledged to scale back the quantity of microplastics launched into the atmosphere by 30 p.c by the tip of the last decade. However our eagle-eyed POLITICO journalists noticed that plans for truly doing this gave the impression to be half-hearted. Learn the story.
Amsterdam Schiphol Airport will get a post-election increase from Wilders’ winWhile Europe was reeling from the shock victory of Geert Wilders and his far-right Freedom Get together (PVV) within the Dutch elections, he had a really particular message for his nation’s largest airport.: “Schiphol is a superb airport” and “we’re happy with it.” It units up a battle between Wilders and native residents who’ve been campaigning to chop noise ranges across the airport, which topic 1.5 million individuals to noise that’s above thresholds set by the World Well being Group. Learn the story.
Governments negotiating on deaths, not simply emissions, WHO official says as COP begins2023 was the 12 months that well being actually grew to become part of the local weather dialog. Forward of the primary official well being day on the COP28 local weather talks, we spoke to the top of the World Well being Group’s local weather change division on how she perceived the talks. “The well being argument is the one that may carry a special sense of emergency or urgency to those negotiations,” she mentioned. “If as a substitute of being an environmental negotiation it might be a well being negotiation, most likely the sense of urgency might be larger.” Learn the story.
Proper-wing lawmakers poised to weaken EU pesticide billAnother month, one other political battle over the Inexperienced Deal — this time pesticides, and this time efficiently killing off formidable environmental reforms. We now have the within story of how the European Fee’s plan to scale back the use and danger of chemical pesticides within the EU by 50 p.c by 2030 was foiled by right-wing members of the European Parliament citing issues for the agricultural sector. Learn the story.
Is Klebsiella the brand new MRSA?The rising menace of antibiotic resistance has been a continuing chorus in 2023. And it was extra unhealthy information in November, when Europe’s illness company reported a surge of bloodstream infections with Klebsiella pneumoniae micro organism, that are resistant to plain remedy. Transfer over MRSA, there’s a brand new life-threatening drug-resistant micro organism on the town. Learn the story.
The Turkey-shaped gap within the EU’s new waste export regimeWhen it involves throwing trash away, the massive query is: The place is away? 2023 was the 12 months the EU determined to place some guiderails round this query, banning plastic waste shipments to non-OECD nations due to the environmental and well being injury. However POLITICO noticed a Turkey formed loophole within the guidelines. Learn the story.
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