FG: Drugs bill not our fault
Colm Burke, the party’s spokesman on health in the Seanad, made the claim as he pointed to figures which showed the cost of drugs in the Irish healthcare system rose by 221% over that 10-year period.
His comments came after criticism by Fianna Fáil in recent days of Health Minister James Reilly’s failure to tackle the State’s €1bn drugs bill. The State is paying 12 times more than Britain’s NHS for some non-branded medicines because of a pricing contract reached with manufacturers two years ago.
Mr Burke said the figures he had obtained showed that while there was an increase in the volume of drugs, the major part of the expenditure was due to “outrageous price increases”.
He said the cost of drugs in each of the four Primary Care Reimbursement Service schemes (PCRS) showed the following increases.
* The General Medical Scheme in 2000 was €338.8m. It rose to €1.233bn in 2010.
* The cost of the Drugs Payment Scheme in 2000 was €140.6m. It increased to €173.4m in 2010.
* Long Term Illness cost the State €41.7m in 2000, but by 2010 that had risen to €126.9m.
* “High Tech” drugs cost €51.9m in 2000 but rose to €361.2m in 2010.
“This adds up to €572m for 2000, increasing to €1.894bn in 2010,” Mr Burke said. “These increases went unchecked by the Fianna Fáil-led administration during that 10-year time period. One area, namely the Drugs Payment scheme, went from €140.8m in 2000 to over €311.9m in 2008 — this was brought down to €173.4 m by 2010. This was one of the few areas where the problem was tackled. All of these figures indicate that the government of the day allowed the pharmaceutical companies to get out of control in their pricing policy.”
He said the State now needs to work towards cutting the cost of drugs and bringing Ireland into line with other EU countries.
He said the Health (Pricing and Supply of Medical Goods) Bill 2012 will be in the Dáil in October.
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