The European Parliament has adopted its own-initiative report “on an EU health workforce crisis plan: sustainability of healthcare systems and employment and working conditions in the healthcare sector” at plenary on 17 September 2026.
The European Biosafety network welcome the final INI Report vote as an important first step in calling for safer working conditions for healthcare professionals across the EU and congratulate the Rapporteurs and Shadow Rapporteurs for all their commitment and hard work.
Among its recommendations, the report also recognises occupational exposure to hazardous medicinal products, the cytotoxic and reprotoxic drugs used widely in cancer care, as one of the occupational risks contributing to workforce shortages. It calls on the Commission and the Member States to properly implement the EU’s Occupational Safety and Health Framework Directive with specific regard to this exposure, in line with the existing Carcinogens, Mutagens and Reprotoxic Substances Directive (CMRD).
Nurses, pharmacists and the wider healthcare workforce who prepare, administer and dispose of HMPs face serious health risks, including cancer and reproductive harm, when protective measures are inadequate. Parliament has now placed that risk within the same policy conversation as staff shortages, pay, burnout and retention, rather than treating it as a separate, technical issue.
By naming this exposure in the same report that addresses staff shortages, pay and retention, Parliament has recognised that protecting healthcare workers from hazardous medicinal products is part of solving the wider workforce crisis, not a separate issue.
An own-initiative report carries no legal force of its own. Its significance lies in the direction it sets, including for the revision of the Carcinogens, Mutagens and Reprotoxic Substances Directive (CMRD 6), which is due for its own plenary vote in early October 2026.
We now call on the Commission to ensure the translation of the INI recommendations into a concrete strategy of policy and legislative measures.
