CoEUP Episode 5 - Preventing shortages in Europe through resilient medicines policies

Conversations on the EU Pharma

Medicines for Europe

Health & Fitness, Medicine

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🗓️ 30 November 2023

⏱️ 19 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This episodes will give to the viewers an insight into the world of off-patent medicines. A world in which we find ourselves in a time that presents or has recently presented us with greater challenges than ever before. Events such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, unprecedented inflation, aging population, increased chronic disease burden and the higher cost of innovative treatments have put immense pressure on healthcare budgets across Europe. However, this is only the tip of the iceberg. To understand the root causes we need to dig a little deeper. Strict pricing rules for generic medicines irrespective of prevailing market conditions and procurement practices solely aiming at obtaining the lowest price for multi-source medicines have been the prime driver of market and industrial consolidation. The substantial consolidation of buying power, allied to the short-term gains of lower prices, has reduced competition and increased the risk of medicine shortages due to the lack of supply diversity. Not only regulatory efficiency measures are critical to reduce pressure on the off-patent sector, but also the implementation of sustainable policies, the lowering of cost containment measures or the adoption of new pricing models to ensure a healthy, competitive, resilient and diversified generic supply. In today's episode, we take a closer look at the origins of this knotty situation in order to better understand its drivers, identify possible solutions and understand what new opportunities the new European Pharmaceutical legislation may offer.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello everybody. My name is Adrian Vanitobin. I'm the Director General of Medicines for Europe.
0:13.0	And I'm here with another podcast episode this time devoted to medicines shortages. I'm sure that almost everybody has seen in the news or possibly
0:22.5	unfortunately experienced a medicine shortage where you go to the pharmacy of the hospital and your
0:26.5	medicines are not there. Today we're going to talk about some of the challenges that are causing
0:30.6	medicine shortages, but also the policy solutions that can be considered to reduce them and
0:35.8	eventually eliminate shortages because everybody should
0:38.4	have access to medicines. So I'm very pleased that we have Eric TCA from Teva, who's here today
0:43.1	to talk about a study they did on medicines shortages, and Katerina Padavu, who's from Pev,
0:47.8	the Association of Generic Medicines Manufacturers in Greece, who's going to tell us about what
0:52.5	they've done in Greece to reduce medicine shortages. Eric, let's start with you. Tavis produced a study with the ominous title,
0:59.9	the case of Europe's disappearing medicines cabinet. Tell me about that study and what's going
1:04.6	wrong and what can we do right. First of all, thank you so much, Adrienne, for hosting us today.
1:09.0	As you mentioned, shortages is a key topic that needs to be tackled.
1:13.7	Shortages, let's be clear, are unacceptable, right? Because they're making patients and the whole healthcare system suffering.
1:20.4	So I'm very glad to be here today with you to discuss about the root causes and what needs to be done to address the shortages.
1:25.4	The report that we published this year
1:27.5	called the case of European Disappearing Medicine's Cabinet,
1:30.4	because at Teva, we believe that this is our duty
1:32.4	to really understand the current dynamic of the market
1:35.0	and how to address the current situation.
1:37.7	What we found out is that 69% of generics
1:41.2	have less than two suppliers currently on the market,
	...

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