The Council of European Dentists (CED) is a European not-for-profit association which represents over 320,000 dentists across Europe. It was formerly called the EU Dental Liaison Committee (EU DLC), but its name was changed in May 2006. The association was established in 1961 and is now composed of 32 national dental associations from 30 European countries.

The association's objective is to develop and execute policy and strategy in order to:

• Promote the interests of the dental profession in the EU;
• Promote high standards of oral health;
• Promote high standards of dentistry and dental care;
• Contribute to safeguarding the protection of public health;
• Monitor, analyse and follow up on all the political and legal developments and documents of the EU that involve dentists, dental care and oral health;
• Actively lobby the European Institutions and Parliament, in order to serve the legal and political interests of dentists, including consumer protection issues

To achieve these objectives, the CED:

• monitors EU political and legislative developments which have an impact on the dental profession
• issues policy statements and drafts amendments to proposed EU legislation so as to ensure that the views of European dentists are reflected in all EU decisions affecting them
• provides expertise for the EU institutions in the areas of health and consumer protection, training, safety at the work place and internal market legislation
• provides a platform for the exchange of information between national dental associations, and supports them in understanding the effects and implementation of EU legislation, in particular members from the new Member States and EU accession countries
• Cooperates with all major European associations of health professionals and other liberal professions on policy issues of common interest