Osteoporosis – the silent disease

Together with Anja Weisgerber MEP, Co-Chair with me of the Osteoporosis Interest Group in the European Parliament,  I was very pleased yesterday to host a special osteoporosis event in the European Parliament. Organised by the International Osteoporosis Foundation (IOF), the event took the form of a lunch, providing an opportunity for the IOF to introduce their work to MEPs and other interested people, and in the process build stronger relations with the European Parliament. The IOF is a small NGO based in Nyon, Switzerland, which aims to educate the public about osteoporosis, empower people to take responsibility for their bone health, persuade governments to make this disease a health care priority, and to assist health care professionals in providing the best possible care to patients and sufferers.

The IOF representatives attending were Professor John Kanis, Professor Juliet Compston, and Victoria Monti. President of the IOF, Professor John Kanis, gave an informative presentation focusing on the urgent need to involve all member states in a coordinated effort to address the gaps in measures to tackle osteoporosis. Osteoporosis is an extremely costly disease, and unless these gaps are acknowledged and addressed these economic costs will only continue to rise as more people are affected.

Professor Juliet Compston, who is the Chair of the EU Osteoporosis Consultation Panel, also gave a short presentation, indentifying eight key targets for the improvement of osteoporosis management in EU member states. These include making osteoporosis a healthcare priority, improving the delivery, integration and quality of osteoporosis education and implementing stronger research schemes. She acknowledged the great progress that has been achieved in osteoporosis prevention and treatment policy. However, she also noted that unfortunately many aspects of management of the disease remain unsatisfactory and more is still needs to be done. At present 21 countries do not recognise osteoporosis as a health priority, and full access to bone density scans and treatments are not currently available to high risk individuals in many states.

It is vitally important to increase people’s awareness and understanding of osteoporosis and to motivate people to take action to prevent, diagnose and treat the disease. Our lunch was a great success, with MEPs from different groups participating in the debate and in some cases even sharing some of their own experiences. I very much hope they will take what they heard back to their member states’ governments.

Later this year, on October 12th, Ms Weisgerber and I will be co-chairing another event in the Parliament, in collaboration with the IOF, to celebrate World Osteoporosis Day. This will be a much bigger full-day event, building on the success of yesterday, with presentations by experts and general discussions. The idea will be to further MEPs’ knowledge of this serious disease and try and put forward plans for action.