With the pandemic, Europe has integrated its weakness in essential medicines. Essential, certainly, but not profitable, with sometimes too polluting syntheses, and above all massively relocated to Asia for twenty years. France has made their relocation a hobbyhorse in the reconquest of health sovereignty, with several projects undertaken on the territory, first and foremost that of Seqens to relaunch the manufacture of paracetamol on European soil.
Elsewhere, other examples are notable, such as the strengthening of the amoxicillin capacities of the Swiss Sandoz in Austria. But these major projects are not legion, despite hundreds of drugs defined as essential. The European Union has supported the movement by accepting significant national aid and has just created the Alliance for Critical Medicines, whose first recommendations are expected at the end of the year. In Europe, the pharmaceutical industry is unanimous: not everything can be relocated and efforts will have to be distributed.
This is indeed the meaning of the French manifesto, presented in April, for a coordinated European relocation plan. The initiative is commendable, but the support is weak, with only eight other signatory countries and the absence of heavyweights such as Germany, Ireland, Spain and Belgium. However, the alarm signals are coming one after the other. Behind increasingly severe shortages, some players are weakening, such as EuroAPI, which will abandon 13 essential active ingredients by 2027, with two factories in the dock in Italy and the United Kingdom. What about the future production of the generic manufacturer Biogaran, if Servier were to sell it, mainly subcontracted in France and Europe? There is an urgent need to mobilize more. Which will not be easy in a Europe focused, and this is also crucial, on innovative medicines.
You are reading an article from L’Usine Nouvelle 3731 – June 2024
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Source: www.usinenouvelle.com
