A Europe-wide petition has been initiated over an EU-Israel healthcare trade agreement which has been awaiting approval by the European Parliament for two years.
The ‘PASS ACAA’ protest was launched as a grass roots initiative for Europeans concerned about the politicisation of their healthcare. The Agreement on Conformity Assessment and Acceptance of Industrial Products (ACAA) seeks to create a single market for Israel’s renowned pharmaceutical goods industry in the EU by eliminating technical barriers to trade and establishing infrastructure and health and safety protection required by EU member states.
The EU-Israel ACAA was approved for signing in March 2010 by the European Council of Ministers prior to being forwarded to the European Parliament for its consent.
Whilst the EU parliament has the power to block it, it has not done so, instead the committee charged with overseeing the agreement, the INTA-international trade froze discussions on the issue, following the controversial flotilla incident in May 2010.
Despite the fact that the ACAA agreement was not designed in order to ‘upgrade’ relations between the EU and Israel, but merely to recognise and facilitate the level of trade which Israel represents to the EU (to the value of €20 billion each year), it has however drawn criticism from Palestinian lobbying groups, who claim it signifies a whitewash of controversial Israel policies.
Conversely, the delayed vote has been slammed by several groups for politicising what is essentially designed to be a neutral trade agreement saving national EU health systems billions of euros each year by providing access to Israel’s highly-developed pharmaceutical industry.
The petition, which is open to signatures by all EU citizens, lobbies Members of the European Parliament to recognise that “for the past two years, Europe’s legislative body has been holding up ACAA, an agreement that harmonises the quality control for pharmaceutical products in Israel and the EU”, stressing that “no legitimate obstacle remains (to ratifying the agreement). Nevertheless, Europeans continue to wait at the expense of their healthcare.”

EJP