China and India challenge Pharma giants to boost their health care systems

Mature pharmaceutical markets such as the USA and European Union countries are showing relatively little change, in contrast to the rapidly evolving health care markets of large emerging nations, China and India, states a new report by health care experts GlobalData.

The new report, Global Healthcare Policy Analysis 2012 – Regulatory, Pricing, and Reimbursement Assessment, examines the profound regulatory changes and economic growth experienced by these two countries which are bringing increased access to medications and healthcare services for millions of citizens.

Over recent years, China has successfully transformed itself into the world’s second largest economy. China’s current Five-Year Plan, setting policy for 2011-2015, was crafted with the goal of boosting R&D, especially in the biomedical sector, and reducing social inequality. The Chinese government is implementing a series of health care reforms, such as extending basic medical insurance coverage to cover 90% of the urban and rural population, and establishing an essential drug supply system to develop a unified distribution network. The plan to construct 29,000 township hospitals, resulting in one hospital for each county, is to be met by the free training of general practitioners (GPs) and the recruitment of new doctors for rural areas.