Galery

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The Ministry of Health is trying to do something similar too. It is stimulating the pharmacists to give the patient low-cost generics and if the insured person prefers the original, he or she will pay a larger portion of it.

A study conducted in the European Union shows that, 2 years after their launching on the market, the prices of generics are, on average, 40% lower than the prices of the originals. The market share of the companies producing generics has reached 45% within two years, which has led to healthcare savings amounting to 20% within a year after the expiration of the original patent. A study on the cost of medicines the patents of which had expired in 2000-2007 shows that they had cost the national health systems 50 billion euro. If their patents had not expired they would have cost 64 billion euro.

The Greek market offers generics manufactured by Greek firms which do not differ from the originals and which are exported to many European countries.