Fostering innovation in the field of public health interventions, prevention strategies, health system management and in the organisation and provision of health services and medical care, including health promotion and disease prevention interventions, has the potential to improve public health outcomes, enhance the quality of care to patients and respond to unmet needs, and also to foster the competitiveness of stakeholders and to improve the cost-efficiency and sustainability of health services and medical care.

Promote the voluntary uptake of health innovation and e-Health by increasing the interoperability of patient registries and other e-Health solutions; support cooperation on e-Health in the Union, in particular on registries, and its uptake by health professionals.

In developing partner countries where the EU supports the health sector, it provides assistance to the health-care systems, either supporting integrated service provision that includes sexual, reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health services across the continuum of care, or providing budget support to assist countries to improve national health service delivery.

9. Points out that efficient health services are an important tool for regional development and competitiveness; notes that in many Member States health policy is, to varying extents, entrusted to regional and local authorities, and welcomes their active involvement in eHealth project design and implementation; calls for the role of regional and local authorities in developing mHealth services and eHealth infrastructure to be strengthened and urges the development of public-private partnerships to optimise medical services and make the most efficient use thereof; takes the view that a well-functioning multi-level governance approach i ...[+++]s a precondition for the successful introduction and implementation of eHealth and the acquisition and development of new types of digital skill by healthcare professionals and patients;

1. This Directive shall apply to activities relating to the provision of reserved postal services, other postal services or, on the conditions set out in paragraph 2(d), ancillary postal services.

The aim is to standardise the rules governing supply of all activities other than reserved postal services, abolishing the distinction between ‘other postal services’ and ‘ancillary postal services’.