User fees advance in Congress

No user fees, but perhaps user fees.

Abolishing User Fees in Africa

In its 2008 annual report, the World Health Organization (WHO) urged countries to " resist the temptation to rely on user fees " [1, p. 26]. Indeed, the consensus in the scientific community is that user fees have harmful effects on health care use and household budgets, especially for the poorest [2]. Still, as the WHO observes, " …most of the world's health-care systems continue to rely on th...

Congress is likely to approve generic drug user fees: action should spur faster FDA approvals.

$824 billion in the last decade. The cost savings benefit is obvious, and some even claim that generic products can be safer than their brand-name counterparts. Edith A. Rosato, RPh, Chief Executive Officer at the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy, explains: “Generic drugs, by definition, are versions of brand-name drugs that have been available in the marketplace for many years. The longer a dr...

Global Health Systems: Pricing and User Fees

This chapter is concerned with the issue of user fees (or user charges) for public health services. We discuss the implications of user fees for cost-e¤ectiveness, allocative e¢ ciency, equity, progressivity of public health care spending, and quality of service. Each of these is a desirable end in itself, and so each is an important factor in the optimal pricing decision. They are not always c...

How Have User Fees Affected the FDA?

Some policy experts answer that question by arguing that budget constraints contributed to regulatory delays in the past. The reform simply relaxed those constraints by increasing the resources for new-drug review. However, there is little empirical evidence to suggest that changes in the fda’s budget influenced regulatory delays and the speed of review prior to user fees. Other policy experts ...