Balduzzi's reform failed: grown generics of 1%
by MICHELE BOCCI source: La Repubblica 10-14-2012
ROME - 2013 was supposed to be the year of generics for Italy. After the provision of the Ministry of Health which on the day of August forced doctors to write the active ingredient of the drug on the prescription, a surge in sales was expected. But now, two months after that law, there are those who are talking about a flop. Giorgio Foresti, president of Assogenerici does it: «Sales are not going, Italians are not buying them». The packages sold of the so-called equivalents went from 5 million 120 thousand on a monthly average in June-July to 5 million 480 thousand in September. The increase is 6.9 percent. Considering that in our country generics represented around 17 percent of the total medicines sold in pharmacies before the summer, today we have risen to more or less 18 percent of the market. In other words, we are very far from the European average, which is 55 per cent with peaks of 65 per cent in Germany and 85 per cent in the United Kingdom. "Among other things - says Foresti again - the data tell us of a good start at the end of August and a slight drop at the end of last month".
Why are generics not selling as well as expected? Meanwhile, Minister Balduzzi's provision provides that doctors can continue to prescribe the brand name drug with an expired patent to chronic patients who used it, or if they justify their choice in a prescription. Initially the new law had caused family doctors to argue and it is not excluded that someone will continue to mark the product with the "brand" in protest. Then there is the role of patients. Many still prefer brand-name medicines and ask the pharmacist for them, which is permitted by law. Among the elderly, for example, there are those who take more medicines a day and do not feel like having pills delivered in a different shape and color than those to which they are accustomed. He is afraid of making a mess. Thus he pays the difference between the amount reimbursed by the State, which is equivalent to the price of the generic, and the cost of the branded drug.
Those who produce equivalents see gray, while the pharmaceutical companies of "designer" medicines say they see black. "The measure has put us in a crisis," explains the president of Farmindustria Massimo Scaccabarozzi. But while generics sell about 7 percent more, they actually have only a quarter of the market for off-patent medicines. Brands have three quarters of it and their decline should therefore be around 2-3 percent. That is to be very small. «The data show that for some classes of medicines such as antibiotics - Scaccabarozzi points out - there are much more pronounced drops. We then have individual products which, the companies tell us, which also drop by 30-40 percent». Brand-name antibiotics, for example, went from 76 to 64 percent of the market between June-July and September. They held the anti-ulcer, increased from 54 to 51 percent. «We are not against generics - continues the president of Farmindustria - but even before this provision, the citizen could choose them in the pharmacy. In addition to this law
