The winners of the fourth EU Health Prize for Journalists were announced by Tonio Borg, European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Policy at an award ceremony in Brussels. The winning articles, selected from 557 submissions from journalists across the EU, cover issues related to healthcare and health services – with an additional “special prize” on smoking cessation. The winners are:

1st place: Petr Třešňàk writing for Respekt magazine (Czech Republic) for his article “Adventures in ward 14”, which tells the story of a psychiatric hospital ward dealing with the most difficult cases, and a dedicated nurse who made a difference.

2nd place: Ailbhe Jordan writing for the Medical Independent (Ireland) for her article “Is screening a waste of cash?” which takes a stark look at the debate on the value and cost-effectiveness of cancer screening, especially breast cancer.

3rd place: Daniela Cipolloni writing for Oggi Scienza magazine (Italy) for her article “All those lies spread by umbilical cord banks”, which as its title suggests, looks at the controversial subject of conserving a baby’s umbilical cord for future medical treatment.

Winner of the special prize: Tobias Zick writing for NEON magazine (Germany) for his in-depth article “Thick Air” which explores how smoking has gone from being ‘cool’ to ‘uncool’, in Germany by giving an overview of the historical, political, legal and philosophical angles of tobacco control.

Speaking from the award ceremony, Commissioner Borg said: “All four journalists awarded tonight pull no punches both in the topics they raise and the style in which they raise them. Though on diverse topics such as mental health, cancer screening, cord blood banking and tobacco control, the common thread in the winning articles is that they confront uncomfortable issues for which debate is needed at EU level”.

Several relevant people were part of the jury. The Spanish one was composed by professionals related to health field and other ones with a very important knowledge of European affairs. Among the finalist there were two people representing Spain: Melisa Tuya and José Andrés Rodríguez.