WHAT DOES BREXIT MEAN FOR THE PHARMACEUTICAL SECTOR?

Within the EU, € 35 billion a year is spent on research and development in the pharmaceutical industry, with employment covering around 750,000 job positions. Britain has a 10% stake in total pharmaceutical production and funds the sector up to 20%. Between 40 million and 45 million packs of medicines are exported from the UK to the EU. A large part of this number flows to Slovakia. It is also a fact that many medicines are being tested in Britain and then have to go through an approval process that can take months. The approval process falls exclusively within the EU. The question here is whether the British system will remain compatible with what is set up within the EU as now. What will it mean if Britain sets up its system in a way that is not in line with that in the EU? Such a change can represent extremely high prices for specific drugs, or their absolute unavailability. What might such a scenario look like?

To clarify this, I will try to use a specific interpretation of a possible event: the unavailability of specific medicines can occur in the case of medicines that are only authorised in the UK. In such a case, there would be a need for substitution. If a replacement were not available, we would witness a very expensive drug, or in the worst case, patients would not receive the drug, which could put them at risk of death.

If this happens, responsible are the last government led by Robert Fico and Peter Pelegrini. Their party did not take sufficient measures that would at least reverse the negative effects of BREXIT and prepare Slovakia for such a scenario. And they have had time for that since 2016, when the British referendum on staying in the EU took place. I firmly hope that Britain and the EU will find a consensus on this particular issue and that people are not going to be the victims of politics.