Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development Makes Predictions for 2007

by Patricia Green, published on 1/5/07 by MedsAbroad.com

In their annual report, Outlook 2007, Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development (TCSDD) makes some educated predictions about trends in pharmaceutical development and use in the US and around the world. Some of those predictions, which they call "optimistic," include:

• A trend which suggests that new products are more and more often created by small/mid-tier pharmaceutical and biotech companies, which is necessary to fill in where the large pharma companies are increasingly unable to go;
• The FDA will probably require new studies to evaluate off-label uses, rather than using limited data it currently has;
• By 2010, up to 65% of FDA-regulated clinical trials for mainstream pharma companies will be done abroad;
• US pharma insurers will start to use a more flexible system for drug coverage, that will cover more than 90% of prescriptions within limits.

The TCSDD press release quotes CSDD Director Kenneth I. Kaitin: "While drug developers have understood that their long-term viability depends on improving R&D productivity - and have taken steps to address the issue - they're about to see their efforts pay off in terms of improved success rates and greater numbers of new medicinal products reaching the marketplace." Not surprisingly, they're seeing more drug variety, greater accessibility worldwide, and higher utility. That is pretty optimistic!

This is not an industry that is going to be quashed by the Democratic agenda to change how drugs are priced in the US, nor European efforts to keep prices down by limiting the drug supply. Everyone wants better health and longevity, and there isn't much that's going to slow that progress down in the foreseeable future.

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