Skip to main content
Research and innovation

Health research and innovation

Why the EU supports health research and innovation

Europe is facing serious healthcare challenges and the COVID-19 pandemic has shown the importance of coordinating health research and innovation among European countries.

These challenges must be met to grant everybody a long and healthy life. Ageing and the increase in chronic diseases like cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and brain conditions that require diverse types of treatment are increasing costs to potentially unsustainable levels, with the risk of unequal access to care for people across the European Union

External environmental factors, including climate change, as well as the risk to lose our ability to protect ourselves against infectious diseases, for instance due to anti-microbial resistance, are also exposing us to new risks and threats.

The European Union is investing in research, technology and innovation to develop solutions to overcome those challenges.

Under Horizon Europe, the EU's current research and innovation funding programme, the main areas of intervention are

  • health throughout the life course
  • environmental and social health determinants 
  • non-communicable and rare diseases 
  • infectious diseases including poverty-related and neglected diseases
  • tools, technologies and digital solutions for health and care including personalised medicine
  • health care systems

The aim is to find new ways to keep people healthy, prevent diseases, develop better diagnostics and more effective therapies, use personalised medicine approaches to improve healthcare and wellbeing, and take up  innovative  health technologies, such as digital ones.

Finally, European research and innovation in health is about working together across borders, sharing each other's knowledge and resources and improving our health and care systems together.

Health Horizon 2020 research projects from last call

Horizon Europe Cluster 1: Health

Policy focus

Funding opportunities

Horizon Europe

Funding for health under the research and innovation framework programme, Horizon Europe.

Innovative medicines initiative

Joint undertaking between the EU and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations aiming to speed up the up the development of better and safer medicines.

Fit for Health 2.0

Resource for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) which provides a database of researchers and SMEs in the life-sciences sector and provides advice on all aspects related to EU-funded research projects

Horizon Results Platform

Platform where framework programme funding recipients present their results to search, contact their owners and form partnerships

Horizon 2020 dashboard

Interactive reporting platform, composed of a set of sheets that allows series of views to discover and filter Horizon 2020 data

Projects and results

Health programmes database

Database that provides information on the nature of health projects and their results. Managed by the Commission's Consumers, Health, Agriculture and Food Executive Agen

Collaboration and jobs

Find project partners

Look for project partners and view profiles of all organisations that have received funding via the funding and tender opportunities portal.

Partnerships in Horizon Europe

Candidates and approved partnerships in the health area under the research and innovation funding programme, Horizon Europe.

European Reference Networks

Virtual networks involving healthcare providers across Europe. They aim to facilitate discussion on complex or rare diseases and conditions that require highly specialised treatment.

Joint Programming Initiatives

Details of health joint programming initiatives which aims to help EU countries pool resources to tackle major challenges for society.

Scientific publications, tools and databases

Health research tools and databases

The Commission's Joint Research Centre compiles databases and develops software and modelling tools. You can access health related ones here.

EU Open Data Portal

Single point of access to open data produced by the EU institutions. All data free to use for commercial and non-commercial purposes.

OpenAIRE

You can access all scientific publications from Horizon 2020 via OpenAIRE.

Factsheet26 September 2022
Research and innovation to address the impact of environmental factors on health

The quality of the environment we live and work in is a powerful determinant of our health and well-being. Environmental factors such as air, soil and water quality have a significant influence in the risk and incidence of disease.

Publication cover
English
(307.84 KB - HTML)
Download
Factsheet2 February 2021
EU Research and Innovation in the fight against cancer

If no action is taken, the number of people newly diagnosed with cancer every year in Europe will increase from the current 3.5 million to more than 4.3 million by 2035.

Publication cover
English
(271.38 KB - HTML)
Download

Latest

Events