Spanish pensioners will have to pay for prescription drugs for the first time under government plans to curb the country's spiralling drugs budget.
Spain's minister of health, Celia Villalobos, announced last week that her government was going to introduce a “drugs co-payment system” by which pensioners, who currently receive prescription drugs free, will have to pay for drugs according to their incomes.
Ms Villalobos said: “It is neither fair nor reasonable that someone who is unemployed or a worker with three or four children with a monthly salary of 80000 pesetas [£300; $450], is paying 40% of the cost of drugs, whereas a pensioner with an income of 260000 pesetas is paying nothing for them.”
Ms Villalobos's statement is a response to the constant increase in spending on drugs in Spain, which amounted to about $6bn last year. Prescription drugs accounted for 25% of national public healthcare expenditure, the highest proportion in Europe. More than three quarters of that spending went on prescription drugs for pensioners.
Employed and unemployed users of the Spanish state health service have to pay 40% for most drugs. Pensioners, however, pay nothing at all. The new measure, which is being studied carefully by the ministry, may mean that pensioners will have to pay an average of 10% for prescription drugs.
The move has been widely criticised. Dr Angeles Maestro, health spokeswoman of the left wing Izquierda Unida party in the parliament, said: “We will back the minister's measure only if unemployed people are able to get prescription drugs free.”
Consumer groups, however, were divided over the move. The Union of Consumers of Spain, which represents patients, criticised the measure, and the National Association for the Defence of the Public Health claimed that it was unfair. Mr Marciano Sánchez-Bayle, the association's president, said: “Not only do pensioners have more health problems and chronic disorders than other people—hence they have a higher number of prescription drugs—but also most of them have low incomes.”
However, another group, the Organisation of Consumers and Users backed it because “a graduated system according to incomes is fairer.”
After the ministers' cabinet meeting last week, Mr Rodrigo Rato, minister of the economy, told the national media that the measure would bring in an extra £150m a year.
The State Council of Old People agreed to deliver a protest note to the health ministry to try to persuade it to reverse the measure. Pharmaceutical expenses of the state health service in May this year were 7.2% higher than in May last year.