Health Ministry drafts individual reimbursement law: “Access to therapy cannot depend on fundraising”

The Ministry of Health has drafted a law on individual reimbursement: amendments to the Pharmaceutical Law and other acts, the third part of a package with the prescriptions law and the reimbursement act amendment. It has passed pre-consultations and will soon go to public consultation. The aim is to merge today's scattered ways of financing modern therapies (systemic reimbursement, RDTL, targeted import, Medical Fund sub-funds) into one system so patients keep access to treatment.

The law has six areas: the Pre-Registration Access Programme (PPD), rare-disease treatment, targeted import, post-PPD financing, “bridging” financing of a drug technology and reimbursement of targeted import. Emergency access to drug technologies (RDTL) will become “bridging”: the ministry admits the old mechanism worked unfairly, mainly in haemato-oncology, haematology and gastroenterology, and was unavailable to many others. Targeted import will be fully digitised, with application status trackable in the Patient Internet Account (IKP).

“We cannot make access to effective therapies depend on public fundraising,” says Deputy Health Minister Katarzyna Kacperczyk. The ministry wants to split financial responsibility between pharma companies and the budget; about 800 new therapies have entered the system since the previous drug policy began. The draft names no amounts or entry-into-force dates yet.