The pharmaceutical industry spends as much as €91m per year on trying to influence EU policy, according to a new report.

The report, produced by the charities Corporate Europe Observatory and Health Action International Europe, contrasts the €40m lobbying spend registered by the industry with the €3.4m spent by health campaigning groups.

It also notes that adherence to the EU lobbying register is voluntary, and estimates the industry’s actual lobbying spend as £91m – including nearly €20m paid to in-house lobbyists.

Olivier Hoedeman of Corporate Europe Observatory commented: “There is an urgent need to strengthen the EU’s lobby transparency register and make it mandatory for lobbies to sign up and ensure that the information disclosed is reliable.”

Reports have linked industry lobbying to such controversial EU decisions as the enhancing of data protection, delaying the launch of generic drugs; and the major expenditure by member states on vaccines against H1N1 influenza that were not sufficiently tested.

In June 2010 the Social, Health and Family Affairs Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe said that poor handling of the H1N1 pandemic by EU health agencies had led to a “waste of large sums of public money, and unjustified scares and fears about the health risks faced by the European public”.

Richard Bergström, Director General of the EFPIA, said that the organisation and its members supported “full transparency of lobbying activities”. However, he argued, where industry associations such as the EFPIA tried to influence policy making with its views that should be regarded as democratic participation rather than commercial lobbying.

An emergency stockpile of 2 million flu vaccines has been set up in preparation for the UK flu season.

Professor Dame Sally Davies, Chief Medical Officer for England, said that the extra supplies will “smooth things out”, in contrast to the shortages reported in certain areas of the country last year, with older jabs being used to fill the gap.

This winter’s stock consists of 16.7 million vaccines compared to 14.7 million last year.

Once again, there will be no promotion of the jabs in England, but Scotland and Northern Ireland will raise awareness through advertising. Professor Davies said that she relies on charities, health workers and pharmacies to spread the word.

Professor David Salisbury, the Government’s Director of Immunisation, warned that it would be taking a risk to miss the vaccination this year: “You need it just as much as last year.”

He warned there was no evidence that last year's vaccination would still offer protection and criticised healthcare workers for avoiding the shot, saying they were “selfish” for neglecting the importance of their patients’ health and of those around them.

Professor Salisbury claimed that healthcare staff are being encouraged to get the shot, but also said that hospitals need to make it easier for workers to get vaccinated.

Last year, 35% of healthcare employees were vaccinated with the flu shot, an increase of 26% from the year before.

The jab will protect against swine flu (H1N1) as well as the H3N2 and Flu B strains. These are the same three viruses that were covered by the vaccine last year.

Read more of the story on the BBC website.

The Government has been forced to seek extra supplies of seasonal flu jabs and release stocks of its 2009 pandemic vaccine.

The move follows reports that some GPs were running out of flu vaccines and were unable to source additional stock from colleagues.

But Dame Sally Davies, the UK’s interim Chief Medical Officer, dismissed any worries of shortages by saying “we have everything in place that we need”.

Mixed H1N1 vaccine © GSK

The number of patients in intensive care in England with suspected or confirmed flu fell from a peak of 851 earlier this week to 783 by Thursday. The cumulative death toll across the UK has risen to 50 but figures suggest less people have been affected than in recent outbreaks or the 2009-10 pandemic.

To combat the reported shortages Dame Sally has written to GPs to informing them of a website created by the DH for primary care trusts to place orders from the official stockpile of H1N1 vaccine.

The current system used to calculate required levels of flu vaccine has also come under scrutiny. Ministers have requested a review of whether to scrap the current method which relies on doctors’ assessment of patients at risk and that are willing to be vaccinated. The review may see procurement again centralised.

The Government says it still has 12.7m unused doses of vaccine, with about 18 months’ shelf life, of pandemic flu vaccine, which provides protection solely against H1N1.