The assessment of Member States' first programmes of measures to control air emissions finds that the implementation of the new European clean air rules needs improvement. Member States need to step up efforts across all sectors to make sure their citizens can breathe clean air, preventing respiratory diseases and premature death caused by breathing polluted air, the EU press service reported.

On Wednesday, the European Commission has submitted a proposal for a record budget for EU expenditure in 2021, aimed at addressing the immediate economic and social damage brought by the coronavirus pandemic and kickstarting a sustainable economic recovery.

It’s more than two years since a flagship update to the European Union’s data protection regime moved into the application phase. Yet, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has been dogged by criticism of a failure of enforcement related to major cross-border complaints - lending weight to critics who claim the legislation has created a moat for dominant multinationals, at the expense of smaller entities.

Innovation performance continues to improve across the EU, surpassing for the second year the United States, but more efforts are needed to catch up with global innovation leaders like South Korea, Australia and Japan, shows the European Innovation Scoreboard 2020, released by the Commission on Tuesday. 

The EU is concerned about the recent surge in declarations on Libya as they work against the de-escalation of the conflict, the bloc’s chief spokesman for the foreign policy said on Monday, commenting on the Egyptian president’s threat of military intervention.

An already registered generic drug used to treat osteoporosis, Raloxifene, could be an effective treatment for Covid-19 positive patients with mild or asymptomatic infection, EU-funded consortium Exscalate4CoV announced on Thursday.

New tools to tackle the distortive sequels caused by foreign subsidies in the single market following the principle “Do as we do”, were presented on Wednesday by the Commission in a dedicated White Paper. With and extensive discussion until 23 September this year, the executive is searching for views and feedback from different stakeholders on the choices set out in it as to help the executive to prepare appropriate rules in this field.

Ensuring the quality, safety and efficacy of vaccines and securing swift equitable access to an affordable vaccine for Member States while leading the global solidarity effort are the main objectives of the European strategy to accelerate the development, manufacturing and deployment of vaccines against Covid-19, presented by the Commission on Wednesday.

Apple on Tuesday found itself the target of two EU antitrust investigations into its App Store and Apple Pay as the bloc turned up the heat on online gatekeepers over alleged anti-competitive business practices aimed at blocking rivals.

A set of technical specifications to ensure a safe exchange of information between national contact tracing apps based on a decentralised architecture, were agreed on Tuesday by Member States, supported by the Commission. It relates to the vast majority of tracing apps in the EU that are already running or those that will be launched soon.