A 'pan-European' system to harmonize the price of new medicines in all EU member countries. The project is being studied by the European Commission and aims to standardize, in addition to prices, also the methods of evaluation which lead to the definition of the so-called 'added therapeutic value' of a new treatment. This was announced by Thomas Lonngren, head of the EU regulatory agency Emea, in an interview on the sidelines of a symposium on bioequivalent products promoted in London by the European Generic Medicines Association. The first step, Lonngren explained, will be to organize "high-level talks" on the subject in the last few months of 2006. To date, specified the number one of the EMEA, "the European Commission has no power in terms of harmonizing the price of drugs and assessing the added therapeutic value". An effort of uniformity that "cannot be born on a voluntary basis", but which is designed in a more structured way. And this is precisely the EU's intention for the future.
