Background
The Health Helix was amongst the first tranche of Helix communities launched by Crowdhelix in early 2013. The Helix is led by the Ludwig Boltzmann Gesellschaft, an Austrian non-university-based research organisation. The current contact point at the LBG is Daniel Spichtinger, Programme Manager for Grant Strategy & Policy.
The Ludwig Boltzmann Gesellschaft (LBG)
The Ludwig Boltzmann Gesellschaft (LBG) is an Austrian non-university research organisation with thematic focus in medicine and the life sciences as well as the humanities, social and cultural sciences. Together with academic and other partners, we operate the Ludwig Boltzmann Institutes (LBI) and the Ludwig Boltzmann Research Groups (FG) at various locations in Austria. These institutions are created after strict selection processes, initiate new research topics, can react flexibly to current social and scientific developments and conduct interdisciplinary pioneering research. At the same time, they offer scientists the freedom to think outside the box. As the Crowdhelix leader one of our focus areas will be clinical research.
Scope
Closely intertwined with the activities of a great many other Helixes, the Health Helix provides an open innovation community for experts seeking international collaborators to carry out health-related research and innovation in support of the following overarching objectives, based on the Horizon Europe Strategic Plan 2025-2027:
- Staying healthy in a rapidly changing society
- Living and working in a health-promoting environment
- Tackling diseases and reducing disease burden
- Ensuring equal access to innovative, sustainable, and high-quality healthcare
- Developing and using new tools, technologies and digital solutions for a healthy society
- Maintaining an innovative, sustainable, and competitive EU health industry
Horizon Europe
The Health cluster in Horizon Europe (Pillar 2, Cluster 1) aims to improve human health and well-being and make healthcare systems more inclusive, accessible, sustainable and resilient to cross-border health threats, demographic change and the impacts of climate change and environmental challenges. Digitalisation and new digital technologies such as AI are key to responding to these challenges, as a tool to accelerate scientific discovery for health issues.
All of the above challenges are both complex and interdependent. They have, however, been chosen by the EU because they address key concerns and provide a clear perspective on what benefits people, patients, and populations as well as what various institutional, social, and economic stakeholders can expect from research & innovation interventions. The Health Helix is also oriented towards the activities of the Horizon Europe “Mission Cancer”, which aims to improve the lives of more than 3 million people by 2030 through prevention, cure and for those affected by cancer including their families, to live longer and better.
By joining efforts across Europe with citizens, stakeholders and Member States, the EU's Mission Cancer, together with the Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan, will provide a better understanding of the disease. This will allow for earlier diagnosis and optimisation of treatments that improve cancer patients’ quality of life during and beyond their cancer treatment.
The 4 Cancer Mission objectives therefore are: (i) Understanding of cancer, (ii)Prevention and early detection, (iii) Diagnosis and treatment and (iv) Quality of life for patients and their families.Health research & innovation relies heavily upon experts working together across borders, sharing their knowledge and resources. Through promoting pan-European collaboration across the health sector and its many related disciplines, Crowdhelix aims to facilitate the maximum realisation of the many diverse impacts and societal benefits that can be derived from cutting-edge health research & innovation programmes.
- https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-law-and-publications/publication-detail/-/publication/6abcc8e7-e685-11ee-8b2b-01aa75ed71a1
- https://research-and-innovation.ec.europa.eu/funding/funding-opportunities/funding-programmes-and-open-calls/horizon-europe/eu-missions-horizon-europe/eu-mission-cancer_en
