Access to Medicines

Access to medicines is a growing concern for European consumers. A number of recent developments including the economic crisis, the ageing population, technological advances, increased consumers expectations and new health threats present major challenges for sustainability of national health care systems and the medicines they provide.

Consumers face three major challenges: 

• Medicines that consumers need are not being developed.
• New life-saving medicines and older key medicines may be unaffordable.
• Some medicines might be out of stock because of shortages. 

To address these, BEUC compiled a series of recommendations in this position paper.