Health minister warns of costs ‘explosion’ from new generation of drugs

Health minister Miloslav Ludvík has warned of an ‘explosion’ of costs in the health sector connected with the arrival of a new generation of effective but high cost drugs. Future governments will have to deal with the question and try to find new sources of income, he said in an interview with public broadcaster Czech Television. An extra 3.5 billion is earmarked for the health sector in 2018 as a result of higher revenues for health insurance companies. Ludvík explained that some of the new drugs that will be coming on line are tailor made genetic drugs which are highly effective in targeting specific conditions but extremely expensive to produce.

Author: Chris Johnstone