00:00The European Commission wants to extend the Made in Europe tag to medicines.
00:05A proposal presented this Tuesday aims to tackle shortages, especially for essential
00:10drugs such as antibiotics, insulin or painkillers.
00:15Now the EU is highly dependent on third countries, mainly in Asia.
00:22So this initiative represents a significant step forward, as I say, to ensure that these
00:30essential medicines remain accessible, affordable and available to all Europeans who depend
00:39on them.
00:40The plan is to boost the investment for manufacturers both of essential medicines and key ingredients
00:46in the European Union.
00:50So it's definitely a good step.
00:51We're moving towards sovereignty in terms of less dependency on other continents and
00:59other countries on the delivery of medicines.
01:03We're moving also towards greater access for the people of Europe for affordable medicines.
01:13European Health Commissioner Oliver Verghelli's self-imposed 100 days in office deadline was
01:18fulfilled.
01:19But for some MEPs, the proposal was too rushed and turned out to be not enough.
01:25This is not going to bring back medicine production to Europe.
01:29This is not going to solve the problem neither for the patients, neither for the pharma industry.
01:34So it's really a deception and is the proof if something is too much rushed, it is not
01:40fulfilling the expectation that we need.
01:42We have a lot of challenges to face in order to fight shortages of medicines.
01:47Financing the whole plan remains now a key issue, according to some MEPs but also to
01:52several EU health ministers who believe critical medicines should be under the scope of a future
01:58defence funding scheme.
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