“The maneuver approved yesterday by the Council of Ministers calls for sacrifices and rigor from the whole country and, once again, from the pharmaceutical industry already hit in recent years by countless price cuts and reductions. Pharmaceutical companies, absolutely aware of the extreme difficulty of the economic situation, are ready to contribute responsibly to the necessary rebalancing of the Public Finance. Among the various measures, however, there is one that risks creating many more disadvantages than advantages for the country, the one that limits reimbursement to the four lowest-priced equivalent drugs, through auctions. A measure that would have particularly serious consequences under various profiles. For example, by transferring the value of the Italian industrial system – with exports equal to 54% of production – towards emerging economies, which manage to sell low-cost products due to the absence of strict rules in delicate areas such as the protection of workers' rights, quality standards and controls. The damage in this respect would be heavy for companies and very serious for employment in the sector. In fact, such a system would not allow companies operating in Italy to "resist" arms equal to foreign competition, preventing them from confirming and consolidating investments in research and production. The introduction of an expenditure control system of this type would put the very quality of the drug at risk due to an artificial downward run-up, which would not take into account the value of Knowledge of the drug asset over time. Farmindustria is available to formulate alternative hypotheses, which guarantee the same savings without the negative consequences of a measure which risks hurting not only the industry but also the country”.
Farmindustria press release 
