The European public health and blood authorities responded to the threat posed by West Nile virus to blood safety of blood and blood components by adopting preventive measures which are defined in the EU blood legislation, professional guides of the Council of Europe and the EU WNV blood transfusion preparedness plan. The measures include the deferral of blood donors that have visited or residing in a NUTS 3 area considered to be affected (i.e. with at least one confirmed case).

This was the first regional meeting on West Nile fever real time surveillance and good practices on vector-borne diseases. The overall objective was to support the exchange of experience between EU and non-EU neighbouring countries on the surveillance of West Nile fever and the lessons learnt since 2011.

Joint Meeting of the EFSA Animal Health and Welfare Network and the ECDC Emerging and Vector-borne Disease Network on West Nile fever virus surveillance in the European Union

The topic for the 2014 World Health Day was vector-borne diseases.