German Health Care Budget Limits Reached

It comes as no surprise to the pharmaceutical industry that Germany's health care budget has reached its limits. What is surprising, said Karl-Gerhard Seifert, chairman of the German research-based drugmakers association the VFA, is that anyone is surprised. He was speaking at the VFA's annual press seminar in Windhagen, Germany, last month.

Two years ago, the VFA had anticipated that the budget was not suitable "to guarantee a permanent, high-quality pharmaceutical provision for the population," he recalled. Statutory Health Insurance funds' accredited doctors' requests for reimbursement last year due to regional budget overshoots proved that this prognosis was correct, Dr Seifert pointed out.

What remains, he said, are: insecure doctors who are left alone with the conflict of pharmaceutical provision for patients and recourse threats; insecure patients who are not convinced their doctor offered them the best solution for their health problems; and a pharmaceutical provision according to the SHI funds' financial situation.