SA pharma market can expect strong growth
Aspen partnerships open doors to rest of Africa
Increasing partnerships between South Africa’s Aspen Pharmacare and multinational drugmakers will continue to strengthen the company’s position in South Africa, a report by Fitch Solutions states.
The report further says that foreign pharmaceutical companies will continue to look to South African companies for partnerships as a launching platform to enter sub-saharan Africa.
“We note that Aspen has partnered with a number of multinationals to expand access to sub-saharan Africa.
“The company has a long-term co-marketing agreement with Novartis South Africa, while it also has a right-of-use for IP and a mutual cooperation agreement for South Africa with Generics (UK) and Merck Generics RSA, both subsidiaries of Germany-based Merck.
“Aspen is Africa’s largest pharmaceutical manufacturer and a major supplier of branded generic pharmaceuticals, healthcare and nutritional products, and it is therefore our view that its lucrative partnerships with different leading multinational companies will continue to strengthen its position as one of the top pharmaceutical companies in both South Africa and Sub-saharan Africa.”
Fitch Solutions said the local pharmaceutical market would see strong growth, supported by the growing presence of multinational companies, forecasting the market to reach R172.7-billion by 2031. “We expect an accelerating market growth trend, with the prescription medicine market continuing to dominate pharmaceutical expenditure over our forecast period.
“Other key drivers will include the high and rising chronic disease burden, increased government health funding due to ongoing efforts to implement the national health insurance (NHI) scheme and improving healthcare access throughout the country.”
The portfolio committee on health last month resumed its virtual oral public hearings on the NHI Bill that ended in December 2021.
The country’s biggest open medical scheme Discovery, in its presentation to legislators, said private health spend, including the medical aid financing of about 9-million South Africans, equates to R212-billion of healthcare funding.
It warned if NHI eliminated medical schemes as proposed in the bill, the R212-billion funding gap would need to be absorbed by the state.