Our Manifesto for Cymru Wales

Ahead of the Welsh Parliamentary elections on 6 May 2021, ABPI Cymru Wales Director Dr Rick Greville sets out his vision for the next five years of health and care in Wales.

As we’ve all seen over the last year, medicines and vaccines are transforming our lives like never before. Our members have worked collaboratively and collectively to speed up the development and delivery of vaccines and treatments to address the pandemic, whilst continuing to supply cutting edge treatments that improve and save the lives of millions of people.

Here at the ABPI, our manifesto for the forthcoming Welsh Parliament elections outlines our sector’s vision for how we can best capitalise on the advances made by the UK’s life science industry, to improve the health of patients in Wales.

We focus on two main themes:

• Making Wales the best place in the world for patients to benefit from innovative medicines and vaccines
• Building a thriving environment for medicine discovery, so that Wales is at the forefront of world-leading research and development of new medicines and vaccines

Creating an NHS ‘fit for the future’ is about embracing cutting edge technology so all patients in Wales have access to world-class standards of care and disease prevention.

Working together with our members, NHS Wales and patients, the next Welsh Government can deliver patient access to the latest medicines and vaccines. We know this, because since 2016, the ground-breaking New Treatment Fund has strengthened and accelerated access to the newest, innovative, effective medicines for NHS patients across Wales.

Continuation of this progressive £80-million Fund will enable the fast and consistent routine adoption of all medicines found to be clinically and cost-effective, underpinned by a collaborative approach to the horizon scanning of medicines in development, which we have supported since 2016.

Whilst NHS Wales continues to receive funding for the adoption of medicines with positive approval from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and / or the All-Wales Medicines Strategy Group (AWMSG), the New Treatment Fund has additionally facilitated service reconfiguration in the delivery of these innovative treatments, when required.

This policy has benefited patients wherever they live in Wales and has shown that working collaboratively ensures we get the right medicines to the right patients at the right time. It is at the heart of our Manifesto for Medicine in 2021 and we look forward to working with the next Welsh Government to see it continue to deliver against its policy intentions.