In 2009, the Swedish pharmaceuticals market was reformed. One of the stated policygoals was to achieve low costs for pharmaceutical products dispensed in Sweden.
Prices and sales data for off-patent brand-name and generic pharmaceuticals have beencollected, and a log-linear regression model was used to estimate how the policy changes affected thecost per defined daily dose.
The estimated effect is a 19 percent cost reduction per defined daily dose at the retail leveland a 35 percent reduction in the prices at the wholesale level (pharmacies' purchase prices). Theempirical results suggest that half of the retail-level price reduction is due to the introduction of a pricecap for products going off patent and half is due to other components of the reform. Measured at thewholesale level the latter effect is larger than the former.
The reforms reduced the cost per defined daily dose for consumers while beingadvantageous also for the pharmacies, who saw their retail margins increase due to the reform.However, pharmaceutical firms supplying off-patent pharmaceuticals experienced a clear reduction inthe price received for their products.