Thinking big about the future of healthcare

Thinking big about the future of healthcare

-- Why we need a truly global approach to healthcare policy

A former British prime minister, when asked by a young journalist what kept him awake at night, famously replied: “Events, dear boy, events!”

From the Covid pandemic to the war in Ukraine, the last few years have given us more major and unprecedented global events than most people experience in a lifetime. Which raises the question: what can we learn from our recent history?

 From my perspective, deeply anchored in the global healthcare sector, two overall learnings spring to mind.

The first is the critical systemic relevance of off-patent medicines, particularly – though by no means only – in times of crisis.

From the unprecedented demand surge in the early days of the pandemic, through to the ongoing efforts to ensure patient access in a war zone, we have seen that the sustainable supply of essential, often life-saving medicines, is something that we simply cannot take for granted.

In the balance

The vast majority of prescription therapies today – 90% in the US, nearly 70% in Europe and other parts of the world – are off-patent medicines, ranging from antibiotics, the foundation of modern healthcare, through to biosimilars, which introduced much-needed competition into the field of modern biologic medicines.

However, the long-term future of this critical segment is still very much in the balance, as governments and healthcare systems worldwide continue to focus on driving cost savings, even at the ultimate expense of security of supply.

Which brings me to my second learning: the need for clearer, cross-sectorial coordination of global healthcare policy, including a clear “seat at the table” for the off-patent industry.

 Today’s complex global healthcare challenges, from driving equitable access across geographies to ensuring the continued efficacy of antibiotics, simply cannot be solved by individual players, or even nations.

Bigger and bolder

That’s why our industry needs to work with governments, international agencies and policymakers to create a framework for truly global healthcare policies.

We have to pull together and collectively think bigger and bolder, be it to anticipate future pandemics, to mitigate the spread of antimicrobial resistance or to drive access to affordable biologics for patients worldwide.

And that’s not to mention more specific, but equally pressing, issues including harmonization of regulatory and commercial policies to minimize the time and cost of bringing more affordable medicines to the patients who need them.

Much is already happening at local and regional level, including the valuable work done by industry trade associations such as Medicines for Europe and the US Association for Affordable Medicines, but we as an industry also have to take the next step and position ourselves as a truly global industry. The inaugural meeting of the CEO Advisory Committee of the International Generics and Biosimilar Medicines Association (IGBA) this week was a good first step in this direction.

While efficient global supply chains are of key importance for a cost-effective delivery of generic medicines, regulatory, intellectual property and policy frameworks very often are regional or even local. What remains key though is that there are two underlying concepts we can all unite around: that, in economic terms, healthcare is the ultimate global good; and that ensuring healthcare for all is an investment, not a cost.