Session 20

Transforming for health and security

Ukraine as a cornerstone of Europe

Organised by the Country Office in Ukraine, World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe

Under extreme pressure, Ukraine’s health system has continued to provide essential health care services, broadened its benefit package to anticipate war related health needs, and continued the health reform. Over the past years Ukraine has transformed its healthcare system at speed and scale: redesigning and prioritising primary care financing, securing medicines supply chains, implementing digital health across a fragmented landscape, and building advanced trauma, rehabilitation, and mental health capacity – all while sustaining services for millions of displaced and vulnerable people. A vision through Health Strategy 2030 is established to steer the stakeholders during these turbulent times.

These are not aspirational reforms. They are proven solutions developed under conditions that increasingly mirror the challenges facing European health systems: overlapping crises, broken supply chains, rapid population movement, and the need to deliver care beyond the reach of traditional infrastructure.

This session reframes accession as a two-way transaction: Ukraine brings hard-won transformation experience in practical resilience and crisis-driven innovation; the EU brings regulatory frameworks and long-term institutional stability, while individual Member States already have vast partnership experience in mutually-beneficial areas for collaboration. The question is not only whether Ukraine is ready for Europe – it is whether Europe is ready to learn from Ukraine.

Speakers to be announced