The new European Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority (HERA) has presented its first annual work plan with a 2022 budget of €1.3 billion to prevent, prepare for and rapidly respond to cross-border health emergencies. HERA, a key pillar of the European Health Union, aims to replace ad hoc solutions to pandemic management and respond with a permanent structure.
Following the adoption of the 2022 work plan, HERA can now start implementing its actions which include, for example:
- Procuring and stockpiling medical countermeasures for a series of public health threats with a budget of over €580 million
- Releasing over €300 million to research and development of medical countermeasures and innovative technologies against emerging threats
- Putting in place a state of the art real-time health threat detection and intelligence system
- Ensuring the timely provision of COVID-19 vaccines to EU Member States, including variant-adapted vaccines if needed
The overall 2022-2027 HERA budget is €6 billion.