First multi-stakeholder declaration for the future of dental undergraduate training

April 2026, Copenhagen

The WHO Global oral health action plan 2023-2030 calls for measures to improve the oral health workforce curricula and training, as well as to better align private and public oral health workforce training. The collaborative Erasmus+ project “O-Health-Edu” developed in 2022 a Charter and a Vision for Oral Health Professional education across Europe to help reach the milestones outlined under the WHO action plan.

Every year in the EU the automatic recognition principle for regulated professions applies to an estimated 14 000 additional dental degrees. However European dental professionals and stakeholders note that:

• There is currently no unified or aligned dental education framework, with dental education remaining highly fragmented and diverse across European programmes
• The standards set in EU law for the dental clinical training to undertake with patients have not been adapted since 1978

It is with this purpose that on 26 February 2026, a coalition of representatives from across the dental community gathered in Copenhagen to further discuss undergraduate training requirements, building on an initial Stakeholder event in Dublin, in February 2026. 

The declaration was unanimous and reflects clear need for the Union of Skills to update and align minimum training requirements across dental studies. This would complete the insufficient revision in 2024 of training subjects listed in Annex V of the Professional Qualifications Directive (the ‘Directive’).