The fairness of medicines prices remains an issue of widespread global concern. Equitable access to medicines and financially-sustainable health systems are in the public interest, as is ensuring adequate investment in innovation. However, further debate is needed on: What is the concept of a fair price? How fair is any particular price for a specific medicine in a specific country? And how can more fairness be achieved in practice? The British Medical Journal (BMJ) recently published a series of papers, commissioned by the World Health Organization, on different aspects of fair pricing, two of which will be presented in this webinar.
Suerie Moon will present a framework for assessing the fairness of prices, taking into account both buyers’ and sellers’ considerations. Combining several factors including affordability, supply security, research and development (R&D) costs, and fair profit, Moon and colleagues developed the concept of a “fair pricing zone”, taking into account the need for both innovation and access across high, medium and low-resource contexts. Tania Cernuschi will then present how the WHO Market Information for Access to Vaccines (MI4A) project increased the transparency of vaccines prices, and how the resulting information improved understanding of the global vaccines market and informed country practices in price negotiations and procurement.
Speakers
- Suerie Moon, Co-director, Global Health Centre, Graduate Institute, Geneva
- Tania Cernuschi, Programme Manager, Department of Immunization, Vaccines and Biologicals, World Health Organization
Event Materials & further information on the topic
- Presentation by Suerie Moon
- Presentation by Tania Cernuschi
- Q&A Session With the Participants
- Research paper: Defining the concept of fair pricing for medicines, Moon S, Mariat S, Kamae I, Pedersen H, BMJ 2020
- Research paper: Price transparency is a step towards sustainable access in middle income countries, Cernuschi T, Gilchrist S, Hajizada A, Malhame M, Mariat S, Widmyer G et al, BMJ 2020
- Research syntheses: Affordability; Price controls/regulations; Health Technology Assessment; Tiered pricing; Competition Law; Costs of pharmaceutical R&D
- Webinar: Addressing high drug prices - what can be learned from European policies?
- Webinar: Using competition law to address high medicines prices
- Webinar: Regulating drug prices: national and global implications of Canada’s recent reforms
