REUTERS NEXT-European health chief says EU must flex regional muscle to ensure drug access

BARCELONA, April 22 (Reuters) - ​European Union authorities need a broader remit to secure access to newly approved drugs, ​including ‌collective procurement negotiations for several countries, the head of European Medicines ⁠Agency Emer Cooke said on Wednesday. The number ⁠of drug launches in ​Europe has fallen sharply, potentially, hindering patient access to some of the latest medicines, since U.S. President Donald Trump last May ​introduced a new ‌U.S. drug pricing policy.

"I think we're at a very critical point at the moment," Cooke told the Reuters Pharma Europe 2026 event in Barcelona, Spain.

"Everybody's struggling with what the ​impacts of the U.S. policy on pricing will be. And ‌that's not just on pricing, it's on where you do your clinical trials, where you ‌market, where you launch."

Europe is the second biggest market for pharmaceuticals and has universal healthcare, putting it in a "very strong place ​in terms of access" overall, Cooke noted, while urging a more joined-up European approach. Cooke ‌also said in the interview that the EU regulatory review of the first of a new generation of weight-loss pills ⁠would be concluded "very ⁠soon", indicating it would be in ‌the coming weeks or months ahead of the northern hemisphere summer when institutional decision-making ​generally slows. Two ​new oral drugs by Eli Lilly's ‌LLY.N and rival Novo Nordisk have been cleared for a U.S. launch this year. (Reporting by Maggie Fick; Writing by Ludwig Burger; Editing by Barbara Lewis and Adam Jourdan)

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