Generic Medicine Price Discrimination in the Emerging Markets

This paper studies price discrimination in forty emerging markets for forty-nine generic drugs for the therapeutic areas of cardiovascular diseases and infectious diseases. This paper studies how the age of a drug and how income distribution in a country affect the price discrimination of that drug in the country. Price data comes from the World Health Organization and Health Action International database. This paper shows that: (1) the longer the drug has been on the market, the less price discrimination that is present; and (2) the greater the income inequality in a country, the more price discrimination that is present. The paper demonstrates that the public sector sees lower prices overall and sees less price discrimination than the private sector. The results are relevant for public health agencies bargaining for low generic drug prices and for countries denying patent approval to pharmaceutical companies. 2 Generic Medicine Price Discrimination in the Emerging Markets " The future level of global spending on medicines underscores the similar challenges of access and affordability which face those who consume and pay for healthcare around the world. "