jueves, 8 de septiembre de 2011

e-Inclusion Newsletter - 08/09/2011

8 September 2011

Latest News

NEWS ARTICLE
Sustained stakeholder interaction – The Digital Agenda goes local

(1 August 2011) The Digital Assembly is an important step in the annual governance cycle for the delivery of the Digital Agenda, but it is not the only one. As in 2010, a series of meetings will take place in all EU Member States and other European countries, in the second edition of "Digital Agenda Going Local". The aim is to follow up on the Digital Agenda actions from a national and progress perspective.

NEWS ARTICLE
Contribute to the drafting of the European Accessibility Requirements for Public Procurement of Products and Services in the ICT Domain

(26 August 2011) European Commission Mandate M376 requires the three European standards organisations CEN, CENELEC and ETSI to harmonise and facilitate the public procurement of accessible information an communication technologies (ICT) products and services within Europe. They will identify a set of functional accessibility requirements for public procurement, and then develop an on-line toolkit through which public procurers can access these requirements in a structured way as part of the normal procurement process. A series of drafts have been released. You are invited to comment BEFORE 12 September 2011.

Contact: accessibility(at)aenor.es

PRESS RELEASE
EU funded project aims to make self-service terminals more accessible for all

(30 August 2011) An EU-funded project is aiming to make self-service terminals, such as public transport ticket vending machines or public information kiosks and cash dispensers, more accessible for the one in six Europeans who have a disability or the 87 million Europeans aged 65 and over. According to an EU study, only 38% of bank cash machines (automated teller machines or ATMs) across the EU provide voice capabilities to customers with disabilities, far behind the US (61%) and Canada (nearly all ATMs). The European Commission is contributing €3.41 million, half of the overall budget, to the "APSIS4All" project which aims to design and validate personalised interfaces, including contactless cards, to help overcome existing accessibility barriers. Trials will begin in cash dispensers in Barcelona, Spain from September 2011 and at ticket vending machines in Paderborn, Germany from January 2012, and will run for three years.

NEWS ARTICLE
eHealth Week 2012 focuses on the continuity of care and patient centric health services through the use of innovative eHealth solutions

(7 May 2012) Political leaders, hospital managers, health professionals, IT managers and anyone interested in optimal use of advanced information technology and management systems in healthcare, will meet from 7 to 9 May 2012 in the Bella Center in Copenhagen. eHealth Week 2012 will showcase exhibitions from more than 100 Danish and international IT and medical device companies, numerous seminars and workshops and a one-day conference with EU Member States Health Ministers and their top officials. The eHealth week 2012 will focus on the continuity of care from home to hospital and back to home demonstrating how information can flow between these different settings. It will include topics like patient empowerment and chronic diseases management involving investment and business opportunities in healthcare IT.

Contact: ehealth@ec.europa.eu
See also: eHealth activities at the EC

EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT
2nd meeting of the ITU-T Focus Group on Audiovisual Media Accessibility

15 September 2011 Geneva

The main objective of the Focus Group on Audiovisual Media Accessibility (FG AVA) is to address the need to make audiovisual media accessible for persons with disabilities. The Focus Group encourages participation of all standards development organizations (SDOs) working in this area. The FG AVA is open to ITU Member States, Sector Members, Associates and Academia. It is also open to any individual from a country which is a member of ITU and who is willing to contribute to the work. This includes individuals who are also members or representatives of SDOs as well as other interested stakeholders. The third meeting will be held on 17 November 2011 in Barcelona.

See also: Registration

EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT
European Union Contest for Young Scientists

23 September 2011 - 28 September 2011 Helsinki, Finland

The EU Contest for Young Scientists, an initiative of the European Commission, was set up to promote the ideals of co-operation and interchange between young scientists. The event is held in a different European city every year. The young scientists have the chance to meet others with similar abilities and interests and to be guided by some of the most prominent scientists in Europe. In this way, the contest aims to strengthen the efforts made in each participating country to attract young people to careers in science and technology.

Contact: General information

EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT
Dynamic Coalition on Accessibility and Disability workshops at the Internet Governance Forum

28 September 2011 Internet Governance Forum, Kenya

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) established a Dynamic Coalition on Accessibility and Disability. The Dynamic Coalition on Accessibility and Disability will facilitate interaction between relevant bodies, and ensure that ICT accessibility is included in the key debates around Internet Governance in order to build a future where all sectors of the global community have equal access to the Information Society. It organises two workshops at the Internet Governance Forum: "Mainstreaming the disability perspective for an inclusive society" and "Implementing good practices in accessibility for an inclusive society".

EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT
"Innovation for Digital Inclusion" conference

5 October 2011 - 7 October 2011 Gdansk, Poland

The conference, organised under the Polish Presidency of the EU, is devoted to the innovative usage of ICT solutions in addressing societal challenges. The main themes of the conference are: new developments of ICT in inclusive public services; benefits from becoming digitally included and effective models for doing it, ICT and independent living for the elderly; overview of the most innovative national and regional e-Inclusion programmes and initiatives; importance of the e-Inclusion policy to the delivery of the Digital Agenda for Europe.

CALL FOR PROPOSALS
Innovative policies to support healthy, active and dignified ageing and raise the effectiveness and efficiency of spending on social, health and long-term care services and benefits

(Deadline: 26/09/2011) This call is financed by the PROGRESS programme. It seeks to promote the sustainability and quality of health and long-term care provision for the elderly through healthy and active ageing. The objectives of this call for proposals are to provide financial support to projects aimed at designing better policies for healthy, active and dignified ageing in the countries participating in PROGRESS. Projects may focus on different stages of policy development ranging from the identification of potential benefits of healthy and active ageing for sustainable social protection and social cohesion in ageing societies to the design of new policies, their implementation and evaluation. Particular attention should be paid to specifically vulnerable social groups and to parts of the EU where poor health is most prevalent (as assessed by measures such as healthy life expectancy) and where many people are at risk of not receiving appropriate care for a life in dignity. Deadline for submitting proposals: 26/09/2011

New in the Library

AUDIOVISUAL
The FP7 funded BrainAble Project empowers disabled people to feel more independent and in control

28 September 2011

In March 2011 the project consortium, led by the eHealth R&D Group of Barcelona Digital Centre Tecnològic, launched a video to present to the European Commission the first year's prototype of BrainAble that demonstrates an ICT-based solution controlled via a BNCI interface to create an assistive environment. The prototype is considered a proof-of-concept of the full BrainAble system and at this stage includes a BNCI interacting with: (1) home appliances such as a commercial television and a lamp (2) a virtual avatar acting in a virtual representation of user's home; and (3) social environment facilitating the participation in today's modern web 2.0 networks with the access to micro-blogging services such as Twitter. BrainAble has been funded with Euros 2,3 M by the European Commission under the programme ICT FP7 and is expected to terminate in December 2012. BrainAble aims to improve personal independence and social constraints of people with physical disabilities, giving them the possibility to interact with their environment through novel Human-Computer interfaces consisting of sensors measuring the individual physical and emotional state (by means of Brain-Computer interfaces -BCI- combined with affective computing) and integrating their outcomes with virtual environments, smart homes and social networks. BrainAble´s main goal is to improve the quality of life of people suffering from functional diversity by addressing their two major limitations: exclusion from home and social activities.

Contact: PMO(at)BrainAble.org
See also: Brainable project website

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