What is the evidence on legal measures to improve the transparency of markets for medicines, vaccines and other health products (World Health Assembly resolution WHA72.8)?

In 2019 the Seventy-second World Health Assembly endorsed resolution WHA72.8 to improve the transparency of markets for health products. This scoping review aims to support policy-makers in the WHO European Region who seek to develop policies related to market transparency by summarizing the current evidence on the legal implementation of measures to improve the transparency of markets for medicines, vaccines and other health products.

The review identified existing mechanisms to improve the transparency of pharmaceutical markets in two main areas:

the price transparency of medicines, vaccines and health products and
the transparency of research and development costs.
It also identified two disclosure practices in individual countries that could be applied by groups of Member States: pooled procurement (by a national agency or group of payers/providers in one country) and the clearing-house method (of collecting and sharing anonymized, aggregated procurement prices for medical products). In addition, evaluations of price transparency mechanisms in upper-middle- and high-income countries in other regions provide examples of lessons learned for consideration by governments in the WHO European Region.

The decision to promote greater transparency in the pharmaceutical market rests with national governments in the Region. In France and Italy, legal reforms to implement their commitments to price transparency in the pharmaceutical market are consistent with European Union law. These examples may be useful for other Member States planning to adopt laws on the provision of greater transparency.