Opportunities and challenges presented by Indonesia's health care reforms

Indonesia's rapidly evolving health care reforms, regulatory requirements and political realities offer significant challenges as well as attractive opportunities for research-based pharmaceutical companies, according to a new report from health care advisory firm Decision Resources.

In 2012, two-thirds of the Indonesian population was covered by some form of health insurance, which will be expanded to all of its citizens by 2019, under the government's bold plans for a national health insurance (NHI) system that comes into effect from 2014.

The Indonesia: Market Access Tracker service finds that, although NHI will provide greater access to medicines to Indonesia's vast population, the roll-out of NHI will also bring with it downward pressures on pricing and reimbursement of patent-protected pharmaceuticals. Existing government-funded insurance offers limited coverage of innovative medicines, and the level of coverage of originator brands in the NHI system remains uncertain.