They’re rinsing the NHS

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Hi John,

Riding high on the record profits from the Covid-19 pandemic, big pharma is now demanding the UK government allows it to make even greater profits from the NHS.

The pharmaceutical industry is trying to water down a key NHS pricing deal which stops the medicines bill from spiralling out of control. The current agreement limits the bill for branded medicines from growing more than 2% each year and ensures that excess profits must be paid back by companies to the NHS. But with the deal up for renegotiation shortly, big pharma are wasting no time in pushing to extract even more profits.

If big pharma get their way, it will cost the NHS an extra £2.1 billion each year on drugs. This £2.1 billion could fill roughly 75% of the more than 52,000 current vacancies in our collapsing NHS. At a time when services are underfunded and health workers underpaid, putting more money in the pockets of pharma industry’s shareholders would be a disaster.

Can you help defend the NHS from big pharma’s latest profiteering efforts by emailing the health secretary today? Please ask him to stand firm against pharma profiteering.

Stop pharma profiteers from rinsing the NHS

These companies are effectively holding the NHS to ransom with their demands for higher profits. This is completely unjustifiable at a time when the rest of society is facing a cost-of-living crisis.

In 2021-2022, the cost of medicines and medical devices in England increased by more than 8%, the biggest rise in at least five years. And if it succeeds in diluting the deal, big pharma will have every incentive to raise prices of new drugs even higher in future.

Pharmaceutical companies are already some of the most profitable in the world, boasting greater profit margins than even the finance or energy industries. Research by the British Medical Journal has revealed that even if drug companies lost a fifth of their profits, they would still outperform 75% of other sectors.

Can you tell the health secretary to refuse to cave in to big pharma’s outrageous demands, and instead insist on a good deal for the NHS?

Write to the Department for Health today

Resisting the corporate agenda of these companies is not just about cost effectiveness but about prioritising what matters – public health over private profits. The prices the NHS pays for medicines are an important international marker for the industry, so this fight could have knock-on effects for everyone.

We are part of a global movement against rising drug prices and the continued impunity of pharma companies. Even in the US, notoriously the bastion of profit-driven healthcare, legislators are waking up and taking action to curb the excesses of this industry.

Together we can demand the UK government resists this corporate ransom and puts our NHS ahead of the interests of CEOs and shareholders.

Thanks for everything you’re doing.

Alena Ivanova
Campaigner at Global Justice Now

Together we can build a system that puts people’s health over profits.

Every year 100 million people sink below the poverty line because of the extortionate prices big pharma companies charge for their medications.

Can you join as a member today and help build a better system and put medicines in the hands of the global south, not big pharma?

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