HEALTH NEWS
Cyprus is lagging behind the rest of Europe when it comes to innovative medical supplies and treatments according to a recent report. The European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) conducted a survey on patient accessibility to innovative medicines across 39 countries in Europe. IInnovative medicines are those given to patients for conditions that do not already have satisfactory treatment available in the market. Results show Cyprus ranked 23rd among 39 countries with just 45 out of a total of 160 innovative medicines approved and available to the public. The average among the 39 countries is 74 out of 160 medicinal products being available, that is 46%.
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Cyprus ranked lowest among all participating countries for overall ease of availability, as out of the total of 160 medicines, only 1% is fully available to the public; 6% is only available privately; 9% is not available; and 28% is under limited
availability. For the remaining 56% Cyprus did not complete a full dataset and therefore availability is unknown. The proportion of medicines available to patients without restriction was also problematic as according to the survey, in Cyprus, only 2% of the 45 products were fully publicly available, with the remaining 98 per cent subject to restrictions.
