Savings from Generic Drugs Adds Up over Last Decade

Use of generic drugs has saved the U.S. healthcare system more than $1 trillion over the last decade, reports the Generic Pharmaceutical Association (GPhA) in a new study that cites analysis from IMS Health.

“Generic drugs improve outcomes and lower costs,” said Mark Merritt, president and CEO of the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association (PCMA), in a press release issued by PCMA. PCMA promotes pharmacy benefit managers, which work to increase generic utilization. “Policymakers can increase access and savings in Medicare, Medicaid, and other public programs by fully leveraging PBM tools like flexible formularies and mail-service pharmacy.”

In its press release, PCMA points out the following findings from the IMS report:

• 2011 savings from generics increased 22 percent over the prior year, marking the largest year-over-year increase since 1998, and 10 percentage points higher than the 10-year average.
• Savings from newer generic medicines—those that have entered the market since 2002—continue to increase exponentially, totaling $481 billion over the past 10 years.
• Generic versions of central nervous system (CNS) drugs, such as antidepressants and anticonvulsants, and cardiovascular drugs account for 57 percent of the annual savings.
• In 2011, nearly 80 percent of the 4 billion prescriptions written in the U.S. were dispensed using safe and effective generic versions of their brand name counterpart drugs.

For more details, visit http://pcmanet.org/.