How the EUCERD Joint Action supported initiatives on Rare Diseases.

Joint Actions are successful initiatives from the European Commission (EC) that have helped to raise awareness and to bring significant benefit to those suffering from a rare disease (RD). In this paper, we will focus on the activities developed by the EUCERD Joint Action (EJA) and by the Orphanet Joint Action ("Orphanet Europe"). EUCERD Joint Action was co-funded by the EC and the Member States between 2012 and 2015 to help to define the activities and policies in the field of RD and foster exchange of experiences amongst Member States. This project is the continuation of previous efforts to turn RD a priority in the EC Health Programmes. "Orphanet Europe" was a Joint Action co-funded by INSERM, the French Directorate General for Health and the EC to address the need for a common portal that would gather the most update information regarding RD. This need was identified in the European Commission report "Rare Diseases: Europe's challenge" and in the Recommendation of the Council for a European RD portal. These joint actions have supported the policy development work of the European Commission, through the support of their committees for rare diseases. In this paper, the authors aim to raise awareness of the work done by the EUCERD Joint Action on behalf of the rare disease community and the policies established.