Accord Healthcare Backs Medicines for Europe's Bid for Wider EU Medicine Access

By Ian Weatherhead- Senior Director, Public Affairs, EMENA

As the EU institutions deliberate on the reform of the critical EU pharmaceutical legislation, focused on the ‘access’, ‘affordability’ and ‘availability’ of medicines across the Union, Accord Healthcare is pleased to support Medicines for Europe through the endorsement of its election manifesto, focused on the ‘levelling up’ of the European health union.

With the EU’s general pharmaceutical legislation not having been revised since 2004, the policy decisions that the EU will validate over the coming months and fully implement during its next mandate (from July this year) will shape national health systems and influence the health and well-being of millions of citizens across Europe.

This week we joined off-patent industry colleagues in Brussels to lend our support to this new agenda and the priorities set out in Medicines for Europe’s manifesto, to ‘leave no patient behind’. The off-patent industry provides close to 70% of the medicines dispensed in Europe, and therefore plays a central role in providing patients access to treatments, through the 27 member states and beyond.

Accord Healthcare employs around 2,000 colleagues across the EMENA region and with a presence in all 27 member states. The company has over 9,000 medicines marketed across Europe, with over 40 oncology and oncology-related treatments across its portfolio.

In addition, we have a significant manufacturing footprint in Europe, so we instinctively echo the call of Medicines for Europe for greater investment in off-patent medicines manufacture, to make it more competitive, more sustainable, and more digitally-enabled; in turn contributing to stronger health resilience across the continent.

The full Medicines for Europe election manifesto can be found here, but can be summarised as follows:

OUR PRIORITY

• Reform of EU pharmaceutical laws for equitable access, by fostering timely competition and sustainable uptake of generic, biosimilar and value-added medicines.

OUR COMMITMENT

• Drive competition in pharma markets to increase access and sustain healthcare budgets.
• Invest in affordable off-patent innovation to solve healthcare and patient challenges.
• Improve supply chain security and reduce shortage risks.
• Provide transparency on temporary disruption of supply.

WE CALL ON THE EU TO

• Support pro-competitive measures in the pharma and intellectual property legislations, especially to stop delays to generic and biosimilar entry.
• Facilitate earlier entry of generics and biosimilars to increase competition and availability in all Member States.
• Create a framework for value added medicines development.
• Tackle the economic root causes of medicine shortages and facilitate a solidarity-based allocation of medicines across the EU to solve shortages.
• Reform tender policies with EU guidance on medicine procurement.