Pharmaceutical policy in Colombia

This chapter aims to provide an overview of Colombia’s pharmaceutical sector from 1993 to 2016. The 1993 Colombian Health Sector Reform was a radical change and led to the implementation of a compulsory social health insurance scheme covering essential medicines and use of generic products and International Nonproprietary Names for prescription and dispensing. This chapter provides valuable information about current country pharmaceutical achievements and challenges in the implementation of the General System of Social Security in Health (SGSSS). Over the past 22 years, health insurance coverage expanded from less than 20% in 1993 to over 97% in 2015. However, access and rational and effective use of health services and medicines are still burdened by inequality and inefficiency. Ensuring effective access to medicines in so-called scattered areas is one of the country’s major challenges. The Government is currently working on developing a special health model for these areas. The 2012 National Pharmaceutical Policy has promoted positive scenarios of specific policies such as pricing system, biologics regulation, and interesting joint initiatives between the health sector and research on drug use, which may provide useful future interventions in the rational use of medicines. In 2015, a Statutory Law was also enacted to ensure the fundamental right to health. Currently, shifting to an implicit approach that involves the definition of an explicit exclusion list instead of the explicit inclusion list has become the medicines coverage challenge for the health system.