German Doctors And Health Funds Launch Positive Drug List

A positive drug list has been introduced by the Berlin Doctors' Chamber, the BAK, and the German federation of interior health funds, the IKK, despite earlier statements by Germany's federal Health Minister, Horst Seehofer, saying he was opposed to the idea (Marketletters passim).

The Berlin list contains 400 of the most frequently-used active ingredients contained in some 600 finished drug products. The doctors' president, Ellis Huber, said the "voluntary positive list" would provide quality management for doctors and was a model for Berlin with "federal overtones." Dr Huber noted that prescribing had increased markedly over the last few months, and there had been a trend away from generics and back to costly original drugs.

And IKK president Uwe Conrad pointed out that while the federal government did not intend to include a positive list in the Health Structure Law, here was a case in which funds and doctors had got together and produced one on a voluntary basis.