Janssen exec looks at problem of fair pricing for medicines

Martin Price,  vice president of health economics, market access and reimbursement for Europe, Middle East and Africa, at Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) pharma subsidiary Janssen, in a posting on the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EPFIA) website, says that the key issue that keeps him awake at night is how we, at Janssen, can best collaborate with payers to accelerate patient access to ground-breaking treatments. And how we can do so while maintaining a sustainable life sciences industry and addressing payers’ concerns around affordability.

For cancer treatments offering the potential for sustained, long term response, or maybe even a cure, the formal methods of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) and current funding mechanisms are challenging. HTA agencies require information on patients’ overall survival to inform their decisions, which can take years to generate with the new generation of cancer medicines, because patients are living much longer than previously expected. And where current solutions to de-risk reimbursement decisions rely on overall survival data, they do not adequately recognize the value of innovation. It is imperative that all stakeholders work together to find a way forward that’s in the best interests of our patients.

Creative thinking required