Brussels, 5 May 2025 – To mark Heart Failure Awareness Week (5–11 May 2025), the European Heart Network (EHN) is launching its campaign From Failure to Future, highlighting the urgent need for stronger cardiovascular health policies and more meaningful patient involvement at EU level.
Over 10 million people in the European Union live with heart failure — a condition where the heart cannot pump enough blood to meet the body’s needs, often due to it becoming too weak or stiff. Each year, between 2 and 7 new cases occur per 1,000 individuals. This figure is expected to rise due to ageing populations, late diagnoses, and inadequate prevention strategies.
EHN’s campaign features a video series bringing together people with lived experience of heart failure from across Europe — including Belgium, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Romania, and Spain — who are also active advocates through national heart foundations.
They address critical issues including primordial prevention, early diagnosis and treatment, rehabilitation, mental health support, and ensuring equitable access to care.
The MEPs featured in the campaign include Peter Liese (EPP, Germany), Manuela Ripa (EPP, Germany), Elena Nevado del Campo (EPP, Spain), and Maria Walsh (EPP, Ireland), who express strong support for a comprehensive EU Cardiovascular Health Plan and reaffirm their commitment to shaping it with patients, not just for them. Open dialogue of this kind is essential to ensure that health policies reflect the real needs of people living with cardiovascular disease.
EHN urges decision-makers to build on the momentum of Heart Failure Awareness Week by reaffirming their commitment to placing patient perspectives at the heart of the European Cardiovascular Health Plan.
The European Heart Network (EHN) is a Brussels-based alliance of foundations and associations dedicated to preventing cardiovascular diseases (CVD), representing patient interests, and funding research throughout Europe.
EHN’s mission is to play a leading role — on behalf of patients and people in Europe — in promoting cardiovascular health and in preventing and reducing cardiovascular disease, particularly heart disease and stroke. The goal is to ensure that CVD is no longer a major cause of premature death and disability across Europe.
This will be achieved through evidence-based advocacy, research promotion, networking, capacity-building, and by representing the interests of patients and the wider public.
For media enquiries:Alessandra Boschi, Advocacy and Communication Coordinatoraboschi@ehnheart.org