The Danish Government warns against a new EU proposal that would have a negative impact on research opportunities in Denmark.

The Danish Ministries of Education & Research, Justice, and Health has drawn up a non-paper that outlines the negative consequence of the proposed new EU rules.

In January 2012, the European Commission's proposal for a General Data Protection Regulation was put forward in order to avoid the misuse of personal data in registries. According to the ministries, the proposed law would lead to more restrictive rules for the use of data from registries.

Great setback

The ministries say the proposed new rules would constitute “a major setback for health research - not only in Denmark but in Europe and worldwide”.

Danish law provides an independent legal basis for processing of personal data for scientific purposes. Even though there is no  requirement of consent when processing data for these purposes, there are however  appropriate safeguards and conditions in place in Danish law to ensure the rights and  freedoms of data subjects when their personal data is being processed for these  purposes.

The European Parliament established in March 2014 that it supports a requirement of consent from the data subject - on a case by case basis - when processing  sensitive personal data for scientific purposes, including any use of individual-level data  in e.g. research projects. 

But according to the Danish ministries, “it would render it virtually impossible to utilize existing population-based registries or large population-based cohorts for research if there is a requirement of consent from each individual for every study utilizing public registries or large cohorts containing information on tens of thousands to millions of individuals.”

Follow this link to read the full non-paper.

- translated by Martin Havtorn Petersen

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