About the WHO - Health Information Network
The World Health Organisation Regional Office for Europe (WHO-Europe) Health Information Network (HIN) is a network established in 2024. It fosters collaboration between the WHO Member States (MS) in the European Region to exchange expertise, build capacity and harmonize data collection and statistics generation, for improved data and health information for policy-making (further information can be found in the terms of reference – TOR, see pdf). Almost all 53 MS are currently represented in the HIN.
The HIN harbours 4 working groups (WG): 1. WG on data collection; 2. WG on digitalization and innovation; 3. WG on analysis, health reporting and knowledge translation; 4. WG on Governance and resources.
Collaboration and activities
The Netherlands is represented in the HIN by a technical expert (RIVM; member of WG 3) and a strategic expert (Ministry of Health; member of WG 2). RIVM contributes to the HIN from within the context of the grant Arrangement WHO-MoH NL Partnership Programme.
WHO HIN is preceded by the European Health Information Initiative (EHII)(see pdf). The EHII was jointly signed into action in 2012 by the WHO-Europe and the Dutch MoH, through the National Institute of Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), for the purpose of strengthening health information and health information systems in Europe.
It attracted 24 Member States, various stakeholders and the EC and OECD as partners and functioned until 2020.
Under EHII, RIVM contributed to the development of, among others, a web portal for health information, a monitoring framework; a combined indicator set for WHO-Euro, the EU (European Union
) and the OECD (see pdf); and capacity building (Autumn Schools on health information).
Under HIN, RIVM contributes to the development list included in the European Program of Work (EPW, 2020–2025) measurement framework (MF)(see pdf). It thereby focuses on indicators for health effects of climate change and mental health.
The development list contains topics that are deemed highly important for the WHO European Region, but for which either no well-defined measures have yet been included in Region-wide international data collection, or for which measures do exist, but data are available only for a limited number of Member States (see pdf). The measurement framework consists of a set of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets and related indicators and milestones to track progress towards the aims and ambitions of the EPW. The EPW was endorsed by the Netherlands in 2020 and the resolution for the measurement framework was adopted in 2021. In 2025 (October 30, EPW2 (2026–2030) was adopted by all 53 Member States.