February 20, 2007

pharmacologists comment on drug pricing in the UK

Comments follow an Office of Fair Trading report recommending that the UK system for drug pricing is reformed.

Raymond MacAllister, Professor of Clinical Pharmacology at UCL, said:

“Most doctors and patients don’t realise that the PPRS exists, or how it decides on the costs of medicines to the NHS. The OFT’s investigation opens a debate that is long overdue. It is well to remember that the drug industry spends twice on the marketing its drugs than it spends on research. Yet, for some reason, it is always expensive research that is used to justify the high cost of medicines. Any approach that increases the cost-effectiveness of the medicines that the NHS purchases is to be welcomed.”

David Webb, Professor of Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Edinburgh, said:

“Some new medicines that might offer benefits to patients are currently licensed in the UK at prices, often global prices, that do not appear to provide reasonable value for money to the NHS when reviewed by bodies like the Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE). I welcome the further discussion that will be provoked by the OFT report about the creation of an approach, at arms length from organisations like SMC or NICE, that could negotiate a value-based price to the NHS for such medicines. An important issue here is that such changes would have to go hand in hand with NHS patients getting better access to then cost-effective developments.”