Pharmaceutical industry to pay £550 million in 2016 as part of the PPRS

The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) has announced a new financial agreement, as part of the Pharmaceutical Price Regulation Scheme (PPRS), that will see the pharmaceutical Industry pay around £550 million in 2016 to help pay for medicines for NHS patients.

The PPRS is a unique scheme where pharmaceutical companies agreed to contribute towards the cost of medicines, with the aim of making the latest treatments affordable for the NHS.

ABPI’s announcement means that the payments are restructured, so that around £200million of the estimated payments for 2017 and 2018 will be brought forward to 2016 to help the Government deliver its NHS funding commitment to NHS Chief Executive, Simon Steven’s, Five Year Forward View.

Pharmaceutical industry paid £1 billion so far as part of the PPRS

The pharmaceutical industry has paid around £1 billion back to Government since the inception of PPRS in 2014 and over the five years of the agreement ABPI expects they Industry to pay a total of £3 billion.

Acting CEO at the ABPI, Alison Clough said:  “By agreeing to bring forward these payments, our industry is showing its commitment to patients so they get the medicines they need and also to improving the flow of new and innovative medicines into the NHS. We know that access to new medicines is patchy across the UK and that there are still barriers in the system.   The PPRS is unique; combined with the UK having some of the lowest costs for medicines in Europe it provides us with a real opportunity to use new medicines to help improve health outcomes.  We hope today’s agreement will help us to make faster progress.”

The industry continues to call for more focus on modernising the medicines used in the NHS, to accelerate the use of those medicines which are recognised as offering the highest standards of clinical and cost-effectiveness and which have been recommended for use by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).