This is a finding increasingly shared: many drugs are missing in pharmacies. According to projections by the French Medicines Agency, more than 1,200 treatments or vaccines will be affected by shortages throughout 2019, 25 times more than in 2008. Faced with this shortage, 26 hospital doctors call, in a tribune in the Sunday newspaper , for a "relocation of production" of medicines in Europe.
>> READ ALSO - Drug shortages: the situation "has worsened for several months"
"We support the idea that the production of active ingredients is being repatriated to Europe - they were still manufactured there about fifteen years ago, since the cost of the active ingredient represents only a very small part of the finished product, this relocation. should not significantly penalize the price of drugs, "write these health professionals.
Inventory and a non-profit institution requested
They also ask for the stockpiling of "drugs of major therapeutic interest": "Several months of stocks would help cushion supply shortages.The shortage with its consequences for patients would be prevented," defend these doctors.
Another goal of this forum is to lobby the authorities for the creation of a "non-profit pharmaceutical establishment" in Europe, as in the United States, to produce medicines that have passed into the public domain. "The creation of such a structure will prevent shortages and will be the guarantor of the quality of medicines and just and sustainable prices," say the practitioners.