AMNOG savings in the first third of 2011: compulsory discounts already exceed the billion mark
30.05.2011 10:31
Falling statutory health insurance expenditure on medicines in the first four months of 2011: The statutory health insurance expenditure on medicinal products, including vaccines and test diagnostics, amounted to 9.7 billion euros for the period from January to April 2011 (pharmacy sales price, AVP, less those from manufacturers and pharmacies compulsory discounts provided, without taking into account the savings from discount agreements), which corresponds to a decrease of almost -5%. Sales include 229 million packs sold and are therefore almost stagnating (+0.5%). Even without taking into account vaccines that are booked by the GKV via a different cost center, the decline in sales is in the same order of magnitude. The subdued development of expenditure is related to several health policy measures that take effect in the context of the AMNOG (law on the reorganization of the pharmaceutical market), which has been in force since January 2011.
Service providers in the pharmaceutical market have to pay compulsory discounts to the health insurance companies
In order to limit spending on medicines, the GKV Amendment Act (GKV-ÄndG) came into force in August 2010. In addition to a price moratorium, this included an increase in the manufacturer's compulsory discount (§130a Para. 6 SGB V) for prescription-only, patent-protected preparations without a fixed price to 16% of the pharmaceutical company's selling price, as well as a price moratorium set until 2013. Provisions on the level of discounts for other pharmaceutical segments remained in place, such as 10% for generics and 6% for off-patent prescription and over-the-counter preparations without a fixed amount. These regulations also apply under the AMNOG, which came into force in 2011. As part of this, it was stipulated for the first time that private health insurance companies would also benefit from compulsory discount payments.
In 2011, the wholesaler must grant a discount of 0.85% on the selling price of the pharmaceutical company (ApU). This reduces the pharmacy purchase price (AEP) accordingly. As a result, the pharmacy sales price (AVP) is lower.
The pharmacy discount, i.e. the discount that the pharmacies give to the statutory health insurance companies for each pack dispensed prescription medication was increased from 1.75 euros to 2.05 euros.
Mandatory haircuts already amount to 1.2 billion euros in the first four months
The increased fees charged by service providers have resulted in 749 million euros in compulsory discounts being paid by pharmaceutical manufacturers alone in the first third of 2011. In addition, there are 415 million euros in pharmacy discounts and 55 million euros as a result of wholesale discounts. In total, there is already a compulsory discount volume of 1.2 billion euros for the period from January to April 2011.
Link: This media information including a graphic to download can also be found under
http://www.imshealth.de/de/artikel/id/15375