Pharmaceuticals

OVERVIEW Pharmaceuticals

A licence to make a biosimilar drug has been granted.

SECTOR HIGHLIGHTS

Pharmacy Direct has spent R100-million on a warehouse upgrade.

South Africa has one of the world’s biggest HIV/Aids programmes. The National Department of Health’s Centralised Chronic Medicines Dispensing and Distribution programme aims to reach six-million patients on treatment by 2021. It is currently serving 4.4-million patients.

In mid-2018 Pharmacy Direct, an Afrocentric business based in Centurion, spent R100-million on upgrading a warehouse for distributing medicines to state patients. This sector is likely to grow if the state goes ahead with plans for National Health Insurance. The NHI intends to create a single fund that will buy services on behalf of all South Africans.

The National Association of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers (NAPM) has re-branded as Generic and Biosimilar Medicines of Southern Africa.

A new field opened up in the pharmaceutical industry when the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA) gave

ONLINE RESOURCES

Centre for Advanced Manufacturing: www.cfam.co.za Chemical and Allied Industries’ Association: www.caia.co.za Generic and Biosimilar Medicines of Southern Africa: http://gbmsa.or National Health Insurance: www.health.gov.za/index.php/nhi the go-ahead for the production of a biosimilar drug in July 2018, the first time this has been allowed in South Africa. Teva Pharmaceutical Industries became the first company to win a licence with their version of Amgen’s filgrastim, a white blood cell booster.

South Africa’s pharmaceutical sector is worth approximately R20billion annually. Although there are more than 200 pharmaceutical firms in the country, large companies dominate the field, with Aspen Pharmacare (34%) and Adcock Ingram (25%) the two key players, followed by Sanofi, Pharmaplan and Cipla Medpro.

Among the other big international brands active in Gauteng are Merck, which has a 55 000m² plant at Modderfontein, and Pfizer SA, which runs a laboratory in Sandton amongst its facilities in South Africa. Adcock Ingram is building a new steriles plant for ophthalmic products at its Clayville facility.

The private sector accounts for 80% of pharmaceutical industry sales by value and 20% by volume, while this ratio is reversed in the case of the public sector.