Growth prospects for Japanese pharmaceutical market assessed

The Japanese pharmaceutical market is expected to grow or decline at different rates, depending on therapeutic category, reports the Tokyo-based market research company Fuji Keizai in a new study entitled 2006 Data Book on Prescription Drugs Part 1 and 2.

According to the report, the market for cardiovascular drugs is expected to increase 6% to 1,175.9 billion yen ($9.99 billion ) in 2006, compared to a year ago, with the large antihypertensive drugs sector driving this category. Although the number of patients with cardiovascular diseases is increasing, the market will remain almost unchanged, or increase just slightly, because compounds other than antihypertensives, especially the new agents for acute CV diseases, have been switching to generics due to the government's several cost-reducing measures including diagnosis procedure combination (DPC). However, the number of patients is expected to increase since CVD is strongly associated with aging.

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