Standing Committees & committees

An advisory report is prepared in a multidisciplinary committee and only becomes final after it has been reviewed by one or more Standing Committees. It is subsequently presented to a minister or state secretary (more information about the working method is provided on the page about the Council). Subjects are arranged according to a number of focus areas: Optimum healthcare, Prevention, Healthy nutrition, Environmental health, Healthy working conditions and Innovation and the knowledge infrastructure.

Standing Committees

The Health Council of the Netherlands has eight Standing Committees, each consisting of approximately 15 members of the Council. The Standing Committees review draft advisory reports of committees in terms of scientific quality and consistency with other Council advisory reports. In addition, the Standing Committees identify issues and developments within a given focus area that are of importance to policy and, when requested, provide advice to the President of the Health Council of the Netherlands about substantive or procedural issues. A Standing Committee can also issue its own advisory reports as an ad hoc committee. Standing Committees are chaired by a member of the presidency.

A Standing Committee deals with advisory reports concerning different focus areas. The specific working areas of the current Standing Committees are:

• Genetics
• Health and the environment
• Health ethics and health law
• Health research
• Infection and immunity
• Medicine
• Nutrition
• Public Health

Committees

Committees consist of members of the Health Council of the Netherlands and other experts. About 30 Committees are usually active at the same time. There are ad hoc committees, which are formed for a specific advisory report, and semi-permanent committees that handle the permanent activities of the Health Council of the Netherlands. These permanent activities are specified on this site for each focus area.

The semi-permanent committees are: 

• Population Screening (BVO)
• Electromagnetic Fields (EMV)
• Dutch Expert Committee on Occupational Safety (DECOS)
  o Subcommittee on the Classification of Carcinogenic Substances
  o Subcommittee on the Classification of Substances Toxic to Reproduction
• Medical Technology Assessment (MTA)
• National Immunisation Programme (NIP)
• Identification of Workplace Risks
• Identification of Environmental and Health Issues

Finally, there is the Netherlands Centre for Ethics and Health (CEG), which is a joint venture of the Health Council of the Netherlands and the Council for Public Health and Health Care (RVZ).