2011/07/13

Kick-Off Meeting

On March 1st 2011 the Kick-Off Meeting of EURECNET project has taken place at the conference centre of the Rheinisches Landesmuseum in Bonn. The main objective of the meeting was to bring together all project partners in order to provide them with information about the aspects of the different working packages and to discuss the further proceeding and strategic considerations necessary in order to set up EURECNET as a permanent platform for the networking of Research Ethics Committees (RECs) in Europe. After a welcome and general introduction to the Kick-Off-Meeting by the Coordinator of the EUREC Project, Dr. Dirk Lanzerath, DRZE; Dr. Lino Paula from the European Commission gave an overview on the project's history and aims, touching upon historical key concepts and milestones of research ethics committees (RECs), the need for European exchange, and hence for the EURECNET Project. Their presentations were followed by presentations by Professor Dr. Elmar Doppelfeld (Permanent Working Party of Research Ethics Committees in Germany, Cologne), Professor David Townend (Care and Public Health Research Institute, Maastricht), Professor Dr. Dominique Sprumont (Université Neuchâtel - Institut de droit de la santé, Neuchâtel), Dr. Michael Bone (The Association of Research Ethics Committees Sunderland, Newcastle), Professor Dr. Eugenijus Gefenas (The Lithuanian Bioethics Committee, Vilnius) and Professor Dr. Knut Ruyter (National Committee for Medical and Health Care Research Ethics, Oslo) who are the leaders of the five main working packages of the EUREC Project.