The Italian Recovery and Resilience Plan (RRP) 2021-2026, the Women, and their Health

Since 2021 the Italian Recovery and Resilience Plan (RRP) has translated the opportunities of the Next Generation EU program (adopted by the European Council in 2020 for the period 2021-2026) into action. The RRP has defined actions and interventions to overcome the economic and social impact of the 2020 Covid pandemic. The Plan mobilizes over 300 billion euros. The RRP defines a broad and ambitious package of investments and reforms to unleash Italian growth potential, to generate a strong upturn in employment, to improve the quality of work and services for citizens and territorial cohesion and to promote the ecological transition. The relaunch action is connected to three strategic axes – digitization and innovation, ecological transition and social inclusion. At the same time, the Plan's lines of action maximize their impact on three overarching priorities: gender equality, young people, and the South of Italy. The RRP addresses these issues favoring women's empowerment, enhancing young people’s skills, abilities, and employment prospects, and increasing the regional rebalancing and the development of Southern Italy. For the Healthcare €20.7 billion have been allocated for strengthening the Italian healthcare system, with actions on two fronts: the development of a local network that is increasingly close to people and the modernization of the NHS's technological equipment. An important part of the first component, namely Proximity Assistance and Telemedicine, which has a budget of €7.9 billion, is aimed at strengthening and reorienting the Healthcare System towards a model centered on local areas and social and healthcare networks, overcoming the fragmentation of the various regional healthcare systems, and ensuring uniformity of the Essential Levels of Care, and strengthening prevention and local assistance. Starting from an analysis of the characteristics and problems presented by the screening programs for the early detection of women's cancers in Italy through the data offered by over ten years of investigation carried out by the PASSI surveillance of the Istituto Superiore di Sanità, I will evaluate in what way the Italian RRP responds, and with what kind of innovations, to the problems of secondary prevention against cancer for women in Italy.