Generic growth

Pharmaceutical market-research company IMS Health predicts that the pharmaceutical market is to grow by 3.7 percent this year - a lower figure than in previous years. By comparison, the year-on-year growth rate was 4.2 percent in 2006 and 7.5 percent in 2005, not to mention 13.1 percent in 2003.

The general director of IMS Health Poland, Stefan Bogusławski, blames falling prices for the lower growth. "This is due to increased numbers of pharmaceuticals on the reimbursement list and increased competition on the market," he said.

Another reason for the falling prices is the increasing use of generic (non-innovative, unpatented) pharmaceuticals. Their share in the general market has been constantly growing in recent years and, in terms of value of the market, grew from 53.9 percent in 2000 to 59.9 percent in 2006. Bogusławski points out that now, even pharmaceutical companies that used to specialize in creating new products are investing in cheaper, generic medicines.

Bogusławski said that the Ministry of Health is partly to blame for this. "Innovative products are not being added to the reimbursement list," Bogusławski explained. He pointed out that new pharmaceuticals are used mainly in hospitals (in cancer treatment, for example), and that the hospital pharmaceutical segment grew at the fastest rate last year - 8.5 percent.

According to IMS Health, the new pharmaceutical law, currently being considered by parliament and expected to come into force later this year, should speed up consolidation of the industry. "There is no return to independent, small pharmacies which were common in Western Europe a few decades ago ... The future belongs to pharmaceutical chains," Bogusławski said.