Dutch Patients "Caught By Health/Industry Policy"

In the Netherlands, patients insured by sick funds and most privatehealth insurers are being denied access to over 30 new drugs, at least half of them New Chemical Entities, which have for many years awaited inclusion in the health insurance system, according to Koen Wiedhaup, group director, pharma, at Akzo Nobel.

He told the annual Conference of Medicines Agencies, organized in The Hague by IMS International (Marketletter April 28), that in its attempts to develop a new drug pricing mechanism, the Health Ministry wants these new drugs to be submitted to its proposed drug development program, for assessment as to their value to public health and thus reimbursability. However, he said, it is still unclear how this "unique" program would be financed, how objective protocols could be designed and which products would qualify. The result might be that Dutch patients would have to wait an extra two or three years before they could receive the new drugs, if at all, and these years would be lost to the drugs' producers in terms of recouping their investment, he said.

Fears For Innovation, Supply Such a program would discourage innovation, he warned, because it would admit successor products to the market without such developmental studies. With the Netherlands representing only 1% of the world market, companies might therefore decide against launching products there, and the Dutch-based industry would also have to consider whether to continue investing in a country that delays or even bans the introduction of its approved products on its home market.