UK's CSR spells trouble for health care sector and Pharma, says Datamonitor expert

Despite the UK Coalition government’s promises that the health budget will be ring-fenced, the spending review announced on Wednesday by the Chancellor George Osborne (The Pharma Letter October 21), it spells trouble for the health care and pharma sector, according to Tijana Ignjatovic, strategic health care analyst at Datamonitor, commenting on the impact of the Comprehensive Strategic Review (CSR) on the health care and pharmaceutical industry in the UK.

“While the National Health Service (NHS) budget is to be increased from £104 billion ($166.5 billion) this year to £114 billion (a 2.3% annual increase) over the next four years, the £10 billion rise would translate into a cut in real terms (should the inflation rate remain above the 2.0% target). This is at a time when the NHS spending needs to increase by 3.0% per year just to meet the growing health care demands of the aging population and rising incidence of certain health conditions such as obesity,” she said.

£42 billion funding shortfall for NHS