Toby 
What does ‘biodegradable plastic’ mean? Can biodegradable plastics help reduce plastic pollution? What policies should be in place to ensure that biodegradable plastics are beneficial to the environment, compared with non-biodegradable plastics?
A new EU-funded research project has set out to study the role of expertise in democracies, how science should inform political decisions, and how to prevent a populist backlash against the notion of ‘expertise’.
Today, the European Commission’s independent Group of Chief Scientific Advisors published their opinion Adaptation to climate change-related health effects which contains advice and recommendations on how the EU can help to make our societies, and in particular the health sector, better prepared and more resilient with respect to impacts from climate change on health.
The European Commission’s Group of Chief Scientific Advisors has published a detailed statement on EU science advice in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, in collaboration with the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies and Peter Piot, a special advisor to Ursula von der Leyen.
SAPEA today published its sustainability plan, which lays out a roadmap for the organisation’s future development in its role of providing evidence for the European Commission’s Group of Chief Scientific Advisors.
Politicians, scientists and civil society need to defend evidence-informed policy as a cornerstone of liberal democracy.
This was the #1 message to send to the new European Commission, as voted by Europe’s science advice community at a major event in Helsinki.
The best available evidence suggests that microplastics and nanoplastics do not pose a widespread risk to humans or the environment, except in small pockets. But that evidence is limited, and the situation could change if pollution continues at the current rate.
A conference examining scientific and social perspectives on vaccination will be held in Amsterdam by two of SAPEA’s member academies, FEAM and EASAC.
The European Commission Group of Chief Scientific Advisors adopted this topic to address policy makers using scientific advice within the European Commission.
FEAM (the Federation of European Academies of Medicine) has published a summary report from a FEAM European Biomedical Policy Forum round table discussion on the use of animals in scientific research, which was chaired by Professor André Parodi, Honorary President of the French National Academy of Medicine and of the French Veterinary Academy.
SAPEA is funded by the European Union. The activities of associated partners Academia Europaea and Cardiff University are funded by UKRI (grant number 10033786).
The views and opinions expressed are those of the authors only, and do not necessarily reflect those of the funding authorities, which cannot be held responsible for them.
© SAPEA 2023
