Why should you care about medicines policy, and what needs to be done?
Because of ageing populations, budgetary constraints and rising healthcare costs – not helped by inefficiency and waste in the system – European healthcare faces unprecedented and growing pressures; pressures that are already threatening the viability of the European healthcare system. Something must be done to safeguard European citizens’ access to healthcare.

Why would you not use generic medicines, biosimilar medicines or value-added medicines?

There is a very simple and obvious way to reduce pressure on healthcare budgets and help ensure the sustainability of European healthcare: increase the uptake of generic, biosimilar and value added medicines. They already massively increase access to medicines (or have the potential to do so) without raising overall treatment costs, and can play a much greater role in improving treatments and health outcomes. Everybody knows there are very significant opportunities to switch from high priced branded medicines with equally effective but much lower cost generic, biosimilar or value added medicines: so why don’t we do it?

The Access to Medicines project aims to make the case for ensuring the sustainability of European healthcare systems, and a common-sense approach to make use of the opportunity that generic, biosimilar and value added medicines do and can bring.