Growth of Brazil's biopharmaceutical sector highlighted by GHP

Just ahead of Brazil’s presidential elections on Sunday (October 3), Global Health Progress (GHP) released a new report that reveals how the biopharmaceutical sector in Brazil, the 10th largest biopharmaceutical market in the world and the largest in Latin America, is an important driver for its economy.

Incumbent President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's enormous popularity was not enough to secure an outright first round win in Brazil's presidential election for his preferred successor, Dilma Rousseff. Needing half of the valid votes for victory, Ms Rousseff of the Workers Party (PT) finished with 47%. This means a second round clash with Jose Serra of the Brazilian Social Democratic Party (PSDB), who came second with 33%, on October 31. The final outcome is likely to impact government policy on health care and the pharmaceutical industry. Mr Serra is thought to have a more pro-industry stance and interest in health care policy (The Pharma Letter December 7, 2009).

In April 2008, the worldwide pharmaceutical industry launched Global Health Progress, an initiative to bring research-based biopharmaceutical companies, global health leaders and policymakers together to build on current partnerships to improve health in the developing world.