The European Union is considering a plan to guarantee revenues to drugmakers to incentivize them to develop new antibiotics, potentially following the UK toward a Netflix-style subscription model after earlier proposals for a voucher program drew criticism.
(Bloomberg) — The European Union is considering a plan to guarantee revenues to drugmakers to incentivize them to develop new antibiotics, potentially following the UK toward a Netflix-style subscription model after earlier proposals for a voucher program drew criticism.
The bloc is looking into procurement mechanisms for access to new and existing antimicrobials that would guarantee revenue regardless of sales volume, EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides said in Brussels on Monday. The grouping still wants to offer transferable exclusivity vouchers as well, she said, adding that they would be granted and used under strict conditions.
The antibiotics program is part of a broad suite of proposed changes in a revised EU pharmaceutical strategy. Due to be presented March 29, the new legislation has been a flashpoint between drugmakers and the 27-nation bloc. The pharmaceutical industry argues that it will disincentivize innovation in Europe, while EU lawmakers say the changes are needed to ensure fair access to medicines for an aging population.
Though the antibiotics vouchers were a rare popular point in the legislation for industry, the scheme has drawn criticism from public health experts. It would offer companies that develop important new antibiotics a voucher to extend the patent on another unrelated medicine for up to a year. The voucher could be sold, thus boosting the monetary reward for the antibiotic developer.
“A transferable exclusivity voucher forces countries to pay for an antibiotic that’s unavailable to patients,” Christine Ardal, a senior researcher at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, and other advocates wrote in the Lancet last month. New medicines take years to be available across the EU, they argued, while extending patent exclusivity would result in higher prices across more countries.
The main other avenue under consideration is a subscription-style model, which would guarantee fixed payments for new antibiotics even if they aren’t used. This is attractive for companies because of the nature of the antibiotics business: powerful new drugs are often held in reserve, to ensure that pathogens don’t develop resistance. The UK is already testing such a program.
“A subscription model ensures attractive financial returns for the antibiotic innovators in predictable ways, while simultaneously stimulating innovation and securing access to important antibiotics,” Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, chief executive of the Novo Nordisk Foundation, said in an email prior to Kyriakides’s speech on Monday.
Drug-resistant infections kill more than 1.2 million people a year, and the World Health Organization estimates that by 2050, the death toll could rise to 10 million people each year.
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