The sluggish development of European generic drug markets depends heavily on demand side factors, and more specifically, patients’ and doctors’ loyalty to branded products. Loyalty to originator drugs, to the point where originator prices rise upon generic entry has been described as the...

Despite the best of intentions, we often act at the last minute when we are faced with a deadline. A recent recommendation by the English National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) to make In Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) available to women up to 42 years of age instead of 39...

At a time when health and social care services in European countries are under pressure to contain or cut costs, informal carers are relied upon as the main providers of long-term care. However, still little is known about the availability of direct and indirect support for informal carers...

EU Health policy exemplifies the philosophical tension between EC economic freedoms and social policy. EC competition law, like other internal market rules, could restrict national health policy options despite the subsidiarity principle. In particular, European health system reforms that...

Policies to expand the traditional role of community pharmacists have been implemented or at least considered in a number of countries, as advocated by academics, professional organizations, and governments. Such reforms come on the heel of pressing system-wide challenges. At a time of growing...

The persistence of socioeconomic inequalities in health is a major policy concern in England, which was addressed by the new labour government in 1997 which prioritised curtailing health inequalities as a policy goal. This paper addresses two related questions: first, it empirically examines the...