[European public health professionals express ten priorities for the European Union...to be followed]

Even if the European Union acquired explicit competencies in public health with the Maastricht and Amsterdam Treaties (articles 129 and 152), public health professionals still have not had their word in the definition of public health priorities. Yet it is they, whatever their mission, who must take into consideration the new constraints imposed by Community directives. The French Society for Public Health (FSPH) took the initiative of running a project, financed by the European Commission, aiming to shed light on some of the public health problems considered priority in the 15 member states, and to provide suggestions for facing them. The FSPH adopted a resolutely participative and pragmatic process. At each step (definition of priorities and compiling arguments), the intention of the SFPH was more to allow different, even diverging, points of view to be expressed, than to aim for a hypothetical representativeness. The undertaken themes are the social gradients in health, alcohol, illicit drugs, tobacco, surveillance of health issues, quality of care, older persons, mental health, the environment, nutrition and food security. This work marks the wish of the FSPH for international openness toward Europe. The FSPH hopes that this work becomes a platform for the development of a reinforced dialogue between public health professionals and European decision makers.