Drugs: Expenditure

(asked on 30th January 2023) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the real terms decline in medicines spend since 2019 on (1) patient outcomes, and (2) foreign direct investment into UK research and development.


Answered by
Lord Markham Portrait
Lord Markham
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
This question was answered on 6th February 2023

An impact assessment was published in December 2022 as part of the consultation on the impact of changes to the Statutory Scheme for Branded Medicines. The Department has received materials from pharmaceutical industry Trade Associations and from individual companies about a wide range of issues relevant to both the voluntary and statutory schemes for branded medicines pricing. We will be considering this evidence over the coming weeks and will publish our response alongside the final impact assessment.

The latest data published by the NHS Business Services Authority on prescribing costs in hospitals and the community for 2021/22 shows spending on medicines increased from £15.74 billion in 2019/20 to £17.78 billion in 2021/22, which is also an increase in real terms.

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