Imperial, WHO and EASL launch first WHO Collaborating Centre dedicated to liver disease

Imperial, the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe, and the European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) have launched the first WHO Collaborating Centre dedicated to liver disease. This took place at Imperial’s White City Campus and was attended by WHO Regional Director for Europe Dr Hans Kluge and Egypt’s Minister of Health and Population, H.E. Prof. Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar.

The WHO–Imperial College London–EASL Collaborating Centre on Steatotic Liver Disease (SLD) – commonly referred to as fatty liver – is the first international body explicitly mandated to turn the World Health Assembly’s resolution on liver disease into national health action across the WHO European Region’s 53 Member States. It is hosted by Imperial and co-directed by Professor Mark Thursz and Professor Pinelopi Manousou, with EASL as its clinical and scientific partner.

Addressing the huge and increasing impact of liver disease

Liver disease is now the only major non-communicable disease still increasing in Europe, even as mortality from heart disease and several cancers has declined. Cirrhosis and liver cancer together cause an estimated 780 deaths a day across the WHO European Region — roughly one every two minutes — and cost regional economies an estimated 47.5 billion GBP (€55 billion) a year, according to the second EASL–Lancet Commission report, published in April 2026. An estimated 1.5 billion people worldwide are living with steatotic liver disease, making it the fastest-growing cause of chronic liver disease globally. 
Over its initial four-year workplan, the Centre will lead a Pan-European baseline assessment of SLD, produce WHO-endorsed policy reports on the three forms of the disease — metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), the combined MetALD form, and alcohol-related liver disease (ALD) — and develop the prevention briefs and training tools that Member States will draw on to build national plans.

Professor Mark Thursz, from Imperial’s Department of Metabolism, Digestion and Reproduction and Co-Director of the SLD Collaborating Centre, said: “Hosting this Centre means Imperial is no longer only contributing evidence on liver disease – we are now part of the mechanism that turns that evidence into national policy across an entire WHO region. 

“Liver disease kills someone in Europe roughly every two minutes; a four-year workplan sounds modest against that scale, but it is the first time the infrastructure has existed to make sustained progress against it.”, added Professor Thursz, who is also Director of the Imperial Academic Health Science Centre (AHSC) and NIHR Imperial Biomedical Research Centre (BRC).

Professor Pinelopi Manousou, from Imperial’s Department of Metabolism, Digestion and Reproduction, Consultant in Hepatology and General Internal Medicine at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, and Co-Director of the SLD Collaborating Centre, said: “Liver disease puts an alarmingly heavy burden on European health Systems. In the UK, for example, SLD accounts for about one in 20 hospital admissions.”  

Dr Hans Kluge, WHO Regional Director for Europe, said: “Every other major killer in Europe - heart disease, most cancers - is moving in the right direction. Liver disease is moving in the wrong one. That should alarm us more than it does. Cirrhosis and liver cancer take a life in this Region roughly every two minutes – around 3% of all deaths. The drivers — alcohol, poor diet, viral hepatitis — are some of the most preventable risk factors. We know what to do. What has been missing is the infrastructure to turn knowledge into national action. Today, that changes. I want to thank Imperial College London for hosting this new Collaborating Centre. This is how we finally act on what we have known for years.”

Egypt was a founding co-sponsor of the World Health Assembly resolution, playing a decisive diplomatic role in building the cross-regional support needed to bring liver disease onto the global noncommunicable disease agenda for the first time.

H.E. Professor Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar, Minister of Health and Population, Egypt said: “Egypt put its name behind this resolution because the evidence left us no real alternative: liver disease is rising even as other noncommunicable diseases come under control, and no country can address it alone. Sponsoring the resolution was the first step. Standing here today, as the Collaborating Centre begins its work, is how we intend to keep it.”

Building on the clinical evidence to benefit patients  

EASL’s network of more than 7,000 hepatologists and researchers across over 120 countries will lead delivery of the Centre’s European evidence base, building on the clinical evidence and sustained advocacy — including through the EASL-Lancet Commission — that underpinned the WHA79 resolution.

EASL Secretary General Professor Debbie Shawcross, who chaired the launch event’s panel discussion, said: “Liver disease is no longer a silent condition — it is a growing public health failure that we have the tools to prevent. What is missing is not evidence, but action.” 

The inauguration also gave voice to patients, represented by Pamela Healy OBE, Chief Executive of the British Liver Trust, the UK’s leading liver health charity, who said: “What doesn’t show up in the mortality figures is the day-to-day impact liver disease has on people long before that — the exhaustion, the uncertainty, the devastating impact on families, and the way it steadily chips away at quality of life. Too many patients are also left feeling isolated, living with a condition that still isn’t widely understood or talked about. This new Centre is a critical opportunity to change that. The British Liver Trust is committed to working alongside it to ensure patient voices shape the response, and to drive the policy changes needed across the UK so liver disease is recognised earlier, prevented wherever possible, and no longer costing lives too soon.” 

This article was first published on 24 June by Imperial College London.