Generics reimbursement plans could lead to shortages, wholesalers warn
Pharmacies may reduce the stock they hold next year |
The Department of Health's plans for reimbursement of generic medicines could create supply shortages next year, according to the British Association of Pharmaceutical Wholesalers. In addition, recent plans to fix the price of four specific generics have been condemned as “cherry picking”.
Steve Dunn, chairman of the BAPW, said in a letter to the DoH that the
Government’s plans are “incomplete”.
“Any move to artificially regulate pricing, price rises and normal
market behaviour could result in product shortages and inconsistent supply,” he
said. Manufacturers may stop producing certain lines and wholesalers
may find products uneconomic to stock.
The BAPW recommends that when product patents expire, instead of fixing
a generic price at an arbitrary percentage of the brand price, a period
of free market pricing is allowed in order to let supply, production
and competition issues work through until the price settles.
The association is also concerned that requirements to submit confidential
customer data about generic medicine purchases is “an unwarranted
intrusion into the day-to-day relationship between business partners”.
Commenting additionally on plans
to fix prices for generic versions of
doxazosin, omeprazole, lisinopril and simvastatin (PJ, 18 October, p533),
Mr Dunn said that this is “the worst example of cherry picking” the
BAPW has seen and that it has come as a considerable shock to its members.
“It is difficult to understand how the Department believes that
acting outside the consultation process in this fashion can do anything
other
than put patient safety at risk in the period leading up to the general
announcement on generics pricing in April 2004,” he said.
The new prices for the four named generics are due to come into effect
on 1 December and are a weighted 30 per cent reduction on previous Drug
Tariff pricing. Mr Dunn says that there is probably sufficient stock
in the market to avoid any impact this year, but pharmacists and wholesalers
are likely to be wary of holding large stocks of generics between February
and April next year and the BAPW is predicting substantial out-of-stock
situations as a result of speculative buying by short-line wholesalers
and pharmacists, as seen in 1999.
The Department of Health’s plan ignores BAPW advice for a phased
reduction in generics pricing and “will lead to considerable stress
for all members of the pharmacy supply chain and for patients in 2004,” Mr
Dunn said.
A separate review of generic
reimbursement in Scotland is planned but
has yet to start (PJ, 6 September, p290).
Comment, p602 |
