| Dear colleagues: from the ashes of the Italian political elections to the excellent electoral result of the UK Independence Party at the mid-term elections in Eastleigh, there is a strong anti-European wind blowing across our continent. Very few citizens can understand better than us how difficult is the Euro-bureaucracy, and how much better the European Commission could work. But it is unquestionable that without the European Commission and the framework program the VPH initiative would not exist.
Science does not tolerate barriers, geographic, political, or cultural. Ideas must freely circulate to increase our collective knowledge on the nature. But for research domains like our, research in itself is a collaborative endeavor. We need to work in large consortia where very different skills can contribute to the achievement of the goal. As scientists we must remain neutral in the political debate around how Europe should be organised and work (but of course not as citizens). But I believe it is important to send a clear message to our politicians that any measure that will make more difficult to fund international research consortia will have a very bad effect on any applied research sector such as our own.
In this sense I would recommend the Policy Affairs Work Group of our VPH Institute to consider a position paper where we strongly demand that the design of Horizon 2020 makes easier to form consortia not only among the member states, but with any other institution in the world, if the research plan motivates it.
If you have opinions on this matter, please share them with me at director@vph-institute.org. Incidentally, if you are interested in the policies relevant to the VPH, please consider to join our Policy Affairs Work Group, which is open to any representative of every member organisation. It will cost you one hour per month for the periodic conference call, but it will be a great way to get engaged. Marco Viceconti Executive Director, VPH Institute | 
