ECHAMP’s annual Membership Assembly is traditionally held in the Member State exercising the presidency of the European Union. This is currently Slovenia, the first Member State of the 10 which entered the European Union in 2004 to perform this official function. Slovenia is also the first newly acceded Member State to have introduced the Euro.

Dr Zivan Krevel, President of the Slovenian Homeopathic Society, will be ECHAMP’s special guest at the Membership Assembly. Homeopathy is known in Slovenia, and demanded by its citizens. However, until Slovenia entered the European Union, it was prohibited. Currently doctors cannot prescribe homeopathy without jeopardizing their license as a doctor; in this the situation is comparable to Sweden. Dr Krevel will explain the position of homeopathic medical doctors in Slovenia. He will be joined by Dr Linda Cicigoj, a homeopathic pharmacist, who will talk about homeopathic manufacturing and the training courses for pharmacists. They will communicate the constructive enthusiasm with which proponents of homeopathy face their local situation. ECHAMP hopes that this event will help the large homeopathic community in Slovenia to improve the situation for the benefit of patients.

ECHAMP’s invitation to the European Commission to give a keynote address was refused due to an overloaded agenda. ECHAMP believes the Commission is missing an opportunity to clarify its policy and point of view concerning this growing industry with key stakeholders – including the doctors’, practitioners’ and patients’ organisations who suffer from lack of availability of certain products in certain Member States.

However, ECHAMP is pleased to welcome Dr Emiel van Galen as the key note speaker on regulatory affairs. Dr van Galen is the recently appointed President of the Homeopathic Medicinal Products Working Group (HMPWG). Over many years he has taken a wide range of initiatives to keep the process of regulatory harmonisation moving forward. He has a thorough knowledge of the regulatory issues concerning homeopathic and anthroposophic medicinal products.

The ECHAMP workshop in Bonn in 2007, ‘Developing a Vision for a Future Legal and Regulatory Environment for Homeopathic and Anthroposophic Medicinal Products in the EU’, identified areas for improvement of the legislation and the guidance environment. As a result, ECHAMP has developed proposals for better regulation for homeopathic and anthroposophic medicinal products with a concrete appeal to the European Commission, the Parliament and the Council. This new report will be made public in Bled.

The aims of the 2008 workshop are to launch this ‘Better Regulation’ document to ECHAMP members and interested stakeholders and to develop a joint strategy and plans for action to achieve an improved legal and regulatory environment for homeopathic and anthroposophic medicinal products all over Europe in the years to come.

We look forward to meeting you in Bled.