A European Commission symposium has heard that that the competitiveness of the European pharmaceutical industry is being overtaken by the US.
Participants heard the EC’s enterprise and information society commissioner (Mr Erkki Liikanen) ask the industry to consider whether the structure of the European market was having a negative effect on prices and innovation. He asked whether the creation of a single European market for medicines had helped the sector prosper or whether more needed to be done to remove trading barriers.
At the meeting, Lord Hunt (Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health) said: "The symposium has presented us with evidence that the European pharmaceutical industry as a whole is becoming less competitive, especially compared with the United States. We must take action to reverse that trend. The United Kingdom has a very strong pharmaceutical industry and an impressive global performance. Eight per cent of all global research and development is done in the UK, and research and development expenditure by the UK industry grew by 108 per cent in the 1990s, outstripping the performance of all other significant producer countries save the USA. This investment is matched by results."
The UK ranked first in world terms of pharmaceutical patents filed per pound invested, Lord Hunt said