Medicines prices in International (Geary-Khamis) Dollar. The comparison between regulated and deregulated markets.

Autor: Zaprutko T; Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Cynar J; Student Scientific Society, Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Sygit M; Student Scientific Society, Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Stolecka A; Student Scientific Society, Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Skorupska P; Student Scientific Society, Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Jaszcz P; Student Scientific Society, Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Kopciuch D; Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Paczkowska A; Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Ratajczak P; Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland., Kus K; Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Social Pharmacy, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: PloS one [PLoS One] 2024 Jun 07; Vol. 19 (6), pp. e0304400. Date of Electronic Publication: 2024 Jun 07 (Print Publication: 2024).
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0304400
Abstrakt: Background: Affordability of medicines is key for effective healthcare. Thus, we compared medicine prices using International Dollar (I$), which allows confronting the values of different currencies. Besides, we intended to verify if pharmaceutical market deregulation leads to lower medicines prices.
Materials and Methods: We conducted the study between December 2019 and September 2022 collecting data from 21 countries. From the preliminary sampling of 30 medicines, we selected 10 brand names (5 Rx and 5 OTC brands) for the analysis. In each country, we collected price information from 3 pharmacies and then converted them to the I$ using the rates published by the International Monetary Fund.
Results: There were differences between regulated and deregulated markets in prices presented in I$. For instance, Aspirin C® (10 soluble pills) was on average I$ 5.41 in Finland (regulated market) and I$ 13.25 in Brazil. The most expensive Xarelto® 20 x 28 pills (I$ 538.40) was in Romania, which in the case of other medicines, was in the group of cheaper countries. There was no statistical significance in price comparison between regulated and deregulated markets. In some cases, however, regulated markets offered lower prices of the same medicine than deregulated markets.
Conclusion: The analysis revealed differences in I$ prices between countries. Pharmaceutical market regulation does not mean higher prices of medicines. There is a need for affordable medicines. Hence, decision-makers should work on the medicines prices and adjust them to the local economies. I$ could be important in creating pharmaceuticals prices, and the conducted study should encourage other researchers to present their results using this currency.
Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
(Copyright: © 2024 Zaprutko et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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