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Abstract
The European Social Charter has recently received increased attention due to the evolution of its monitoring mechanism and the need to address a multitude of contemporary challenges to socio-economic rights. Although the treaty's preamble has played a crucial role in the interpretation of substantive provisions and in shaping state obligations, little attention has been paid to the way in which the preamble has defined the fundamental lines of the 'jurisprudence' of the Charter's monitoring body. The European Committee of Social Rights has deduced from the Charter's preamble several important general principles for the protection of socio-economic rights, on which it grounds its interpretation. This article analyses these principles and evaluates their effects in the relevant practice. The findings suggest that the Charter's preamble serves different purposes and performs multiple functions in international law, thus challenging the common assumption that human rights treaty preambles are empty phrases of a merely ceremonial nature.

On the 5th of July 2017, the European Committee of Social Rights published another decision adopted under the collective complaints procedure, condemning Greece for violating plenty of the European Social Charter provisions concerning labour rights by implementing austerity measures between 2010 and 2014. The Committee adopted a dynamic and analytical interpretation of the Charter setting new criteria, such as the need to take into account the social needs of the most vulnerable when legislating and went even further than in its previous decisions in terms of social rights protection by producing a precedent that can be used as a tool against the application of austerity policies. This paper analyses GSEE v. Greece, Complaint No. 111/2014 before the Committee and attempts to review it under a multi-level context.

E-governance is a process that aims to enhance a government's ability to simplify all the processes that may involve government, citizens, businesses, and so on. The rapid evolution of digital technologies has often created the necessity for the establishment of an e-Governance model. There is often a need for an inclusive e-governance model with integrated multiactor governance services and where a single market approach can be adopted. e-Governance often aims to minimise bureaucratic processes, while at the same time including a digital-by-default approach to public services. This aims at administrative efficiency and the reduction of bureaucratic processes. It can also improve government capabilities, and enhances trust and security, which brings confidence in governmental transactions. However, solid implementations of a distributed data sharing model within an e-governance architecture is far from a reality; hence, citizens of European countries often go through the tedious process of having their confidential information verified. This paper focuses on the sinGLe sign-on e-GovernAnce Paradigm based on a distributed file-exchange network for security, transparency, cost-effectiveness and trust (GLASS) model, which aims to ensure that a citizen can control their relationship with governmental agencies. The paper thus proposes an approach that integrates a permissioned blockchain with the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS). This method demonstrates how we may encrypt and store verifiable credentials of the GLASS ecosystem, such as academic awards, ID documents and so on, within IPFS in a secure manner and thus only allow trusted users to read a blockchain record, and obtain the encryption key. This allows for the decryption of a given verifiable credential that stored on IPFS. This paper outlines the creation of a demonstrator that proves the principles of the GLASS approach.

This review presents seven national asthma programmes to support the European Asthma Research and Innovation Partnership in developing strategies to reduce asthma mortality and morbidity across Europe. From published data it appears that in order to influence asthma care, national/regional asthma programmes are more effective than conventional treatment guidelines. An asthma programme should start with the universal commitments of stakeholders at all levels and the programme has to be endorsed by political and governmental bodies. When the national problems have been identified, the goals of the programme have to be clearly defined with measures to evaluate progress. An action plan has to be developed, including defined re-allocation of patients and existing resources, if necessary, between primary care and specialised healthcare units or hospital centres. Patients should be involved in guided self-management education and structured follow-up in relation to disease severity. The three evaluated programmes show that, thanks to rigorous efforts, it is possible to improve patients' quality of life and reduce hospitalisation, asthma mortality, sick leave and disability pensions. The direct and indirect costs, both for the individual patient and for society, can be significantly reduced. The results can form the basis for development of further programme activities in Europe. ; Peer reviewed

To address uncertainties in the prevention and management of influenza in people with asthma, we performed a scoping review of the published literature on influenza burden; current vaccine recommendations; vaccination coverage; immunogenicity, efficacy, effectiveness and safety of influenza vaccines; and the benefits of antiviral drugs in people with asthma. We found significant variation in the reported rates of influenza detection in individuals with acute asthma exacerbations making it unclear to what degree influenza causes exacerbations of underlying asthma. The strongest evidence of an association was seen in studies of children. Countries in the European Union currently recommend influenza vaccination of adults with asthma; however, coverage varied between regions. Coverage was lower among children with asthma. Limited data suggest that good seroprotection and seroconversion can be achieved in both children and adults with asthma and that vaccination confers a degree of protection against influenza illness and asthma related morbidity to children with asthma. There were insufficient data to determine efficacy in adults. Overall, influenza vaccines appeared to be safe for people with asthma. We identify knowledge gaps and make recommendations on future research needs in relation to influenza in patients with asthma.

Unfortunately this article [1] was published with an error in the Funding section. The BM4SIT project is notacknowledged. This section should be corrected to the below: Funding EAACI and the BM4SIT project (Grant Number 601763) in the European Union's Seventh Framework ProgrammeFP7.

Background: EAACI guidelines emphasize the importance of patient history in diagnosing food allergy (FA) and the need for studies investigating its value using standardized allergy-focused questionnaires. Objective: To determine the contribution of reaction characteristics, allergic comorbidities and demographics to prediction of FA in individuals experiencing food-related adverse reactions. Methods: Adult and school-age participants in the standardized EuroPrevall population surveys, with self-reported FA, were included. Penalized multivariable regression was used to assess the association of patient history determinants with "probable" FA, defined as a food-specific case history supported by relevant IgE sensitization. Results: In adults (N = 844), reproducibility of reaction (OR 1.35 [95% CI 1.29-1.41]), oral allergy symptoms (OAS) (4.46 [4.19-4.75]), allergic rhinitis (AR) comorbidity (2.82 [2.68-2.95]), asthma comorbidity (1.38 [1.30-1.46]) and male sex (1.50 [1.41-1.59]) were positively associated with probable FA. Gastrointestinal symptoms (0.88 [0.85-0.91]) made probable FA less likely. The AUC of a model combining all selected predictors was 0.85 after cross-validation. In children (N = 670), OAS (2.26 [2.09-2.44]) and AR comorbidity (1.47 [CI 1.39-1.55]) contributed most to prediction of probable FA, with a combined cross-validation-based AUC of 0.73. When focusing on plant foods, the dominant source of FA in adults, the pediatric model also included gastrointestinal symptoms (inverse association), and the AUC increased to 0.81. Conclusions: In both adults and school-age children from the general population, reporting of OAS and of AR comorbidity appear to be the strongest predictors of probable FA. Patient history particularly allows for good discrimination between presence and absence of probable plant FA. Keywords: Europe; food allergy; food sensitization; patient history; prediction. ; European Union (EU)

Acknowledgements The authors thank the following individuals who contributed to the initial set-up of ISAR, provided input to the development of the protocol and/or were involved in local implementation of ISAR: Elisabeth Bel, Roland Buhl, Sverre Lehmann, Stelios Loukidis, Richard Martin, Juno Pak, Pearlanne Zelar ney, Joy Zimmer, Christena Kolakowski, Margo Brown, Jessica Cummings, Jennifer Brandorff, Seth Skelton, John Upham, Philip Bardin, Paul Reynolds, David Langton, Peter Middleton, Belinda Cochrane, Katya Vasileva Noleva, Plamen Hristov Yakovliev, Sonya Metodieva Genova, Violina Milchova Vasi leva, Darina Petrova Dimova, Nadezhda K Takovska, Cvetantka Hristova Odz hakova, Eleonora M Stamenova, Diana X Hristova, Vincente Plaza, Ian Hirsch, Cekomir Vodenicharov, Alexandrina Vodenicharova and Magdalena Alexandrova. Medical writing support was provided by Michelle Rebello, PhD, and Liam Gillies, PhD, of Cactus Communications (Mumbai, India). Funding The International Severe Asthma Registry is conducted by Optimum Patient Care Global Limited, and co-funded by Optimum Patient Care Global Limited and AstraZeneca. ISAR is supported by grants from AstraZeneca and Optimum Patient Care (OPC) Global (a not-for-profit social enterprise). The ISAR steering committee (ISC) was involved in the development of the protocol and is responsible for approving research proposals via a democratic voting process. In addition to 47 clinicians and researchers with an interest and experience in severe asthma, the ISC also includes members of OPC and four medical experts from AstraZeneca. AstraZeneca reviewed the draft before submission; however, decision to submit was made by the authors. Medical writing support was funded by AstraZeneca in accordance with Good Publication Practice (GPP3) guidelines (http://www.ismpp.org/gpp3). ; Peer reviewed ; Publisher PDF

Publisher's version (útgefin grein) ; Background: Severe asthma exerts a disproportionately heavy burden on patients and health care. Due to the heterogeneity of the severe asthma population, many patients need to be evaluated to understand the clinical features and outcomes of severe asthma in order to facilitate personalised and targeted care. The International Severe Asthma Registry (ISAR) is a multi-country registry project initiated to aid in this endeavour. Methods: ISAR is a multi-disciplinary initiative benefitting from the combined experience of the ISAR Steering Committee (ISC; comprising 47 clinicians and researchers across 29 countries, who have a special interest and/or experience in severe asthma management or establishment and maintenance of severe asthma registries) in collaboration with scientists and experts in database management and communication. Patients (=18 years old) receiving treatment according to the 2018 definitions of the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) Step 5 or uncontrolled on GINA Step 4 treatment will be included. Data will be collected on a core set of 95 variables identified using the Delphi method. Participating registries will agree to provide access to and share standardised anonymous patient-level data with ISAR. ISAR is a registered data source on the European Network of Centres for Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacovigilance. ISAR's collaborators include Optimum Patient Care, the Respiratory Effectiveness Group (REG) and AstraZeneca. ISAR is overseen by the ISC, REG, the Anonymised Data Ethics and Protocol Transparency Committee and the ISAR operational committee, ensuring the conduct of ethical, clinically relevant research that brings value to all key stakeholders. Conclusions: ISAR aims to offer a rich source of real-life data for scientific research to understand and improve disease burden, treatment patterns and patient outcomes in severe asthma. Furthermore, the registry will provide an international platform for research collaboration in respiratory medicine, with the overarching aim of improving primary and secondary care of adults with severe asthma globally. ; The International Severe Asthma Registry is conducted by Optimum Patient Care Global Limited, and co-funded by Optimum Patient Care Global Limited and AstraZeneca. ISAR is supported by grants from AstraZeneca and Optimum Patient Care (OPC) Global (a not-for-profit social enterprise). The ISAR steering committee (ISC) was involved in the development of the protocol and is responsible for approving research proposals via a democratic voting process. In addition to 47 clinicians and researchers with an interest and experience in severe asthma, the ISC also includes members of OPC and four medical experts from AstraZeneca. AstraZeneca reviewed the draft before submission; however, decision to submit was made by the authors. Medical writing support was funded by AstraZeneca in accordance with Good Publication Practice (GPP3) guidelines (http://www.ismpp.org/gpp3). ; Peer Reviewed