Spanish pharma trade group and government renew the agreement for sustainability, access and innovation

Last week, the Spanish trade group Farmaindustria, the Ministry of Finance and Public Function and Health and the Ministry of Social Services and Equality signed the Agreement that renews, for 2017, the Protocol of Collaboration agreed back in November 2015 with the common objective to ensure the sustainability of the National Health System (NHS) and the access of citizens to pharmaceutical innovations.

The Agreement maintains the same provisions of that that was signed last year, which envisaged a 12-month period and the possibility of annual renewal up to a maximum of three years. It was based on the conciliation of the state’s objectives on the public deficit and sustainability of the NHS, the health and pharmaceutical needs of the population and the future challenges of an industrial sector fundamental to the Spanish economy, such as pharmaceutical. In this sense, the renewal responds to the fulfillment of these objectives and to the climate of dialogue and collaboration that the government and Farmaindustria have been maintaining throughout this time.

The Agreement sets out to match the growth of public expenditure on medicines to that of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), so as to enable the government to meet its budgetary adjustment objectives while ensuring the patients have access to the necessary medicines. In the event that the expected expenditure threshold is exceeded, because the therapeutic needs of society exceed the development of the economy, the government and Farmaindustria are committed to come up with suitable solutions that will make it compatible, including compensation from the industry.