After years of tranquility, the minus sign seems to have suddenly returned to the approved pharmaceutical expenditure, the one that passes through local pharmacies and Local Health Authorities (direct distribution, with or without dpc). At least this is what would have emerged Thursday from the AIFA Board of Directors, whose report accounts for a breach of 100 million euros on the 2010 budget. More will be known about the causes of the deficit in the coming days but the indication that comes from insiders would unload a large part of the blame on the former Osp-2, reclassified in October by AIFA in band A but kept in the direct distribution circuit. As far as it turns out, estimates by the Regions are still underway to lay bare all the spending dynamics, but if the hypothesis were confirmed, creepy scenarios would open up: if in just two months the former Osp-2 managed to "sink" the 2010 agreed spending, who knows the breakthrough that will result in December with twelve months of accounting on the shoulders of the territory. This is not good news for pharmacies but even less so for the Regions. On Thursday they also checked hospital spending, which revealed worrying figures: the budget planned for this year, 2.5 billion (equal to 2.4% of NHS spending), was already used up in June and by the end of the year it should reach 5.2 billion outgoings. In theory, it would be up to local governments to compensate, but the thesis is that the deviation must be attributed to a series of structural causes that are beyond their responsibility. And so the Regions have asked for the urgent convening of the table for governing pharmaceutical expenditure, established by the 2010-2012 Health Pact and at a standstill for about a year and a half. Where intervention measures will be defined to review the mechanisms for purchasing innovative drugs.
September 26, 2011 
