European Commission’s Methods for Assessing Health-related Costs of Environmental Stressors

Deadline: 21-Apr-22

The European Commission (EC) is pleased to announce a call for proposals for the Methods for Assessing Health-related Costs of Environmental Stressors.

Proposed research activities should mainly aim to improve the calculation of the socio-economic costs (and / or benefits) of health impacts during the life-course associated to environmental stressors, or combinations of these, advance methodological approaches and foster their acceptance as common good practice.

Activities

Proposals should consider all of the following activities:

Systematic review and exploitation of latest evidence of exposure-response functions and causation resulting from published medical and scientific research accumulated data from the past 10-20 years, including results published based on EU-funded research projects;
Identification of data gaps as regards environment and health risk factors and health-related tangible and intangible costs and recommendations on priorities for new data collections;
Advancement of methodological rigor and consistency in accounting for morbidity and mortality, disabilities, linking valuation of statistical life and / or life-years with quality adjustments within a unified framework, based on the most recent data available and adapted to the needs and circumstances in Europe ;
Application of experimental approaches addressing the potential link of quality of life and the of disease indicators with more integrative impact indicators (eg reflecting subjective burden well-being, health, work-life balance, education, housing, etc.) and identification of how national contexts can impact on health-related costs of the same environmental and occupational exposure;
Enhancement of the understanding of the role of discounting and other methods for weighing present and future costs and benefits;
Development of innovative tools, methods and models, and associated guidelines for health impact assessments and related cost-benefit analysis;
Consultation of experts and stakeholders on tools, models, methods and assessments developed towards a shared agreement of these;
Development of case studies involving public authorities comparing the costs of action and non-action in at least three EU or associated countries;
Delivery of FAIR data and a user-friendly access to an open knowledge base including results, methodologies and data appropriate for use in public policies and budget allocations.

Funding Information

The check will normally be done for the coordinator if the requested grant amount is equal to or greater than EUR 500,000, except for:

public bodies (entities established as a public body under national law, including local, regional or national authorities) or international organizations; and
cases where the individual requested grant amount is not more than EUR 60,000 (lowvalue grant).

Expected Outcomes

Proposals under this topic should aim for delivering results that are directed, tailored towards and contributing to all of the following expected outcomes:

EU and national public authorities regularly use economic and health modeling in policy impact assessments and policy evaluation, and promote the use of these to other stakeholders;
Stakeholders agree on the most relevant population health and quality of life metrics, including DALYs (Disability Adjusted Life Years) or QALYs (Quality Adjusted Life Years) [1], and economic metrics;
The stakeholder community follows common guidelines and methodologies for integrative socio-economic assessments and cost-benefit analysis of environmental pollution in Europe.

Eligibility Criteria

To be eligible for funding, applicants must be established in one of the eligible countries, ie:

the Member States of the European Union, including their outermost regions;
the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs) linked to the Member States;
eligible non-EU countries:
- countries associated to Horizon Europe;
- low- and middle-income countries.