Overview

A major goal of China’s healthcare reform is to contain costs, and the public, media and regulators see prices of drugs, especially the 307 drugs on the National Essential Drug List, as critical to this effort. This briefing discusses the drive by China’s National Development and Reform Commission’s (NDRC) Drug Price Division and Ministry of Health to achieve this aim.

One policy to help contain drug costs is to set uniform prices for selected essential drugs. The NDRC hopes to select a first batch of uniform-priced essential drugs in 2011.

The NDRC is also promoting a zero-margin sales policy for essential drugs, whereby hospitals may charge patients for drugs only what the hospitals paid for them, plus a fixed pharmacy fee. The goal is to make hospitals stop making drugs a major profit source by abusively over-prescribing them and over-charging for them.