Europe’s heads of state and government on Friday called on the Commission to propose “urgent measures” to ensure sufficient production and availability of essential medicines and their ingredients in Europe.
They also urged the co-legislators to speed up their work on the reform of pharmaceutical legislation, particularly with regard to access to medicines and the competitiveness of the pharmaceutical sector, read the conclusions published at the end of the European summer summit.
Essential medicines and their components have increasingly been produced outside Europe in recent decades, particularly in Asia. This relocation has enabled pharmaceutical firms to reduce their labour costs, but also to benefit from less stringent environmental standards.
In early May, Belgium urged Europe to take back control of the production of medicines threatened by shortages through a 'Critical Medicines Act,' a call supported by 18 other countries, including France and Germany.
Belgian Public Health Minister Frank Vandenbroucke described the European Council’s stance as a “great step forward.”
“The security of the supply of medicines is also a safety issue,” he said in a statement.
Supply disruptions have already caused a shortage of anticoagulants in Europe, while for Antabuse – a drug used to treat alcohol addiction – the continent is now totally dependent on supplies from the Far East, the minister noted.
“The Covid-19 pandemic has taught us that it is absolutely necessary for us to be able to produce (medicines) in Europe and for us to be less dependent on others," he stressed.
