The public financing of pharmaceuticals; an economic approach

SciTech Book News, Sept, 2005

The public financing of pharmaceuticals; an economic approach.

Ed. by Jaume Puig-Junoy.

Edward Elgar Pub. Co.

2005

255 pages

$110.00

Hardcover

HD9666

Ten papers are presented by Puig-Junoy (Research Centre for Economics and Health, Pompeu Fabra U., Spain). Coverage begins with regulation and competition and their effects on innovation and prices, specifically, patents, price regulation systems used in the OECD countries, competition between rival English and Spanish pharmaceutical companies, and the impact of mechanisms designed to encourage price competition on efficiency and welfare. The next group of papers analyzes the effectiveness of supply and demand instruments used by public financing agencies to regulate pharmaceutical expenditure, the participation of the insured in the payment of pharmaceutical price, the use of economic evaluation in pharmaceutical policy, and financial and non-financial incentives for influencing prescriber decisions. The final two chapters consider the current state of pharmaceutical expenditure in Spain and review the research on the economics of pharmaceuticals done by Spanish economists since 1980.

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