Medicines for Europe calls on Heads of State and Governments to build on the lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic, with a thoughtful Industrial Policy that should strengthen European manufacturing and critical medicines supply chain resilience, while ensuring equitable access for patients.
The European structured dialogue initiative [1]is a first positive step in this direction and, if combined with smart policy reforms, results will be delivered: sustainable market reforms to incentivise resilience, a flexible and digitalised regulatory framework focused on quality and efficiency and smart investments through the recovery and resilience facility to maintain and expand the EU manufacturing ecosystem for medicine.
Commenting ahead of the EUCO meeting, Medicines for Europe President Christoph Stoller (Teva) said “COVID-19 has highlighted the strategic importance of a strong and open medicine value chain in Europe. Despite pronounced EU important dependencies and demand surges in critical areas such as ICU medicines, we have demonstrated the resilience of the pharmaceutical supply chain during this unprecedented time, as well as the power of two-way collaborative work with policy-makers to secure access to critical medicines. With smart policy reforms, Europe can address the current drivers responsible for the growing vulnerabilities of its essential pharmaceutical production and supply. I call on EU leaders to support a vibrant medicines manufacturing sector in Europe. it is now time to act to increase Europe’s resilience, diversity and sovereignty while capitalising on fair and open trade”.
Links:
[1] https://ec.europa.eu/health/human-use/events/ev_20210226_en
[2] http://www.medicinesforeurope.com