UK's proposed price controls on biosimilars 'make no sense'

The UK's Department for Health has launched a consultation on its plans to begin applying price controls to biosimilars, proposals that have promptly been ridiculed.

The consultation concerns changes to the Statutory Medicines Pricing Scheme (SMPS), the mandatory price controls which apply to those pharma companies that choose to not sign on to the voluntary Pharmaceutical Price Regulation Scheme (PPRS) which will adopt these regulations itself on December 31, 2018. The government's timetable would see the SMPS adopt the same rules a day later, on January 1, 2019.

Discussing its motivation for the changes, the government acknowledged the potential biosimilars offer for financial savings but maintained that their benefits were not sufficient to escape price controls.