Today marked the launch of Nursing Now Spain with a national event, organised by the Spanish General Council of Nursing, a member of EFN, and attended by key international high-level health and nursing stakeholders, including Lord Nigel Crisp, Nursing Now co-chair; Adelaida Zabalegui Yárnoz, Nursing Now Board Member; Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General; and Howard Catton, ICN CEO. All made it clear that nurses play a crucial role in health promotion, disease prevention and treatment, and their involvement in the policy debate is fundamental to ensure that policy making in health is fit-for-purpose.
At European level, the EFN, also the Nursing Now European regional leadership group, is focusing on nurses’ support to the current political policy driver across Europe – European Pillar of Social Rights – building on 20 key principles (with a focus on those principles that EFN Members have committed to: education; wages; healthcare; and long-term care). The EFN Secretary General reminded that nurses’ need practical solutions for the daily challenges they face while exercising their profession.
Nurses are co-designers of the EU’s agenda for the term 2019-2024 to get fit-for-purpose EU policies. Therefore, it is key to ensure that the National and EU political leaders enact concrete policies that the nurses can successfully influence and contribute to the shaping of healthcare. 3 million nurses are a strong political voice. We need to take the EU election as an opportunity to build a social Europe!