What happens when biosimilars are introduced to the market
A biosimilar is a biological drug that is highly similar to another already approved biological drug (the so called reference drug). Marketing authorizations for biosimilars can be granted no earlier than ?8 years after approval of the reference drug.?
Biological drugs contain active substances from a biological source, such as living cells or organisms and are often produced by cutting-edge technology. Most biological medicines in current clinical use contain active substances made of proteins. The market for biological drug was 11 billions SEK in Sweden 2016, which corresponded to a fourth of the total pharmaceutical market (ref TLV).??
Let’s have a look at the medicine adalimumab and what happened when biosimilars started showing up on the market. Adalimumab is an immunosuppressive drug with various indications and is commonly used to treat e.g. reumatoid arthritis, chronic plaquepsoriasis and ulcerative colitis. The reference drug of adalimumab is Humira.?
The graph at the top of the page illustrates the usage (measured in thousand daily-defined dose, kDDD) of adalimumab in Sweden by quarter 2012–2022. The dark blue line displays the total usage, the green line displays the reference drug, whereas the light blue line represents biosimilars. As we can see, prior to the introduction of biosimilars the use of adalimumab increased steadily. When biosimilars were introduced to compete with the reference drug the total usage increased heavily.
Today, the dominant usage of adalimumab in Sweden is by biosimilars.??
Are you interested in analysing the usage of biosimilars, biological drugs or any other medical products? Let us know. Reveal is a Swedish company with a decade-long track record and dedicated services in RWE, Market access and sales statistics. Please feel free to contact us to know more: [email protected], www.reveal.se.?