Delivering Essential Medicines: The Way Forward

Making essential medicines available in developing countries is a pressing international problem. Behind the humanitarian urgency lies long-term economic, cultural, and even geopolitical challenges. Following up on The Economics of Essential Medicines (2002), this volume extends the debate on the best practical ways of improving access to health care and the delivery of health services. While there have been encouraging signs of increased attention to these issues by public policy-makers in rich countries-such as the recent EU initiative to allow the export of generic drugs to poor countries-huge unsolved problems remain. These are addressed by a wide range of contributors-academics and policy-makers from both rich and poor countries, alongside representatives of NGOs and the pharmaceutical sector. Through a combination of detailed thematic and case studies, this volume aims to show the most promising ways forward to ensure essential medicines become accessible to all.

Amir Attaran is an associate fellow in the International Economics Programme at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (RIIA) and an associate professor at the Faculty of Law and Institute for Population Health, Ottawa.

Brigitte Granville is a professor of international economics and economic policy at the Centre for Business Management, Queen Mary, University of London and former head of the International Economics Programme at RIIA.