Generics To Lead US Managed Care "Soon"

While generic drug products currently account for an average of 38% of prescriptions in managed pharmacy programs, by the end of 1996 they will account for 55% of dispensing, according to Myron Holubiak, chief executive officer of Emron.

He told an IMS meeting this month that while per member/per month spending on drugs in managed-care programs has been steadily increasing each year, by around 6%-9% on a PMPM basis and about 15%-20% in terms of the programs' total drug budgets, over the next year and a half they will start to fall.

Driving this downward trend will be the rapid shift towards generic versions of major products whose patents have recently expired, or will expire within the next year. The most important of these products are SmithKline Beecham's Tagamet (cimetidine), Eli Lilly's Ceclor (cefaclor), Bristol-Myers Squibb's Capoten (captopril) and Marion Merrell Dow's Seldane (terfenadine), he said.