Only modest growth expected for Poland's pharma market between 2011 and 2013

The pharmaceutical market in Poland will be worth 30.9 billion zlotys ($10.85 billion) in 2011 in final prices, 4% more than a year earlier, according to the latest report from Polish market research group PMR, titled Pharmaceutical and healthcare market in Poland 2011.

The increase in over-the-counter (OTC) medicine sales will exceed that of the disappointing year 2010, but this will not counterbalance the weak sales of reimbursed drugs. The sales of the latter might be at their most fruitful directly before the introduction of fixed margins and prices, which will take place, in accordance with the latest draft Reimbursement Act, on January 1, 2012.

In 2010, the Polish pharmaceutical market grew by just 2%, to 29.7 billion zlotys, the lowest figure in years, according to PMR estimates. The slowdown is attributed in part to a high comparative base (a 9% year-on-year increase in 2009), as sales in 2009 were boosted by the early peak of the flu season and concerns about swine flu, which impeded the increase in early 2010. Between 2011 and 2013 PMR expects relatively modest sales on the overall pharmaceutical market. The main reasons are the anticipated cuts in reimbursement and the reduction in the purchasing power of patients with regard to reimbursed drugs (as a result of changes to the reimbursement system in Poland which are to come into force in 2012).