The European Union should develop its own medicines for treating rare diseases and not rely on the pharmaceutical industry, professor Hans Büller, executive board chairman of the Erasmus medical centre in Rotterdam, said at the weekend.

The discussion around the cost of expensive medicines for diseases such as the metabolic disorders Pompe and Fabry began three weeks ago when health insurance council CVZ said payment should be scrapped from the health insurance package.
Professor Büller says we have a ‘social duty’ to people with rare illnesses, the treatment of which can reach €700,000 a year per patient.
Tsunami
In an interview with Nos tv, he warned that a ‘tsunami’ of new medicines is coming our way in the next few years.
‘As rich western countries, let us for goodness sake not remain dependent on the pharmaceutical industry,’ he said.
The professor says setting up a European consortium to develop new medicines would mean only the investment need be earned back, keeping the cost to health services low.
‘The industry only develops new medicines to make a profit which threatens people with rare diseases,’ he told the Nos.
Last Thursday, health minister Edith Schippers said expensive medicines will continue to be paid for in the future.
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