With the clock ticking on UK drug pricing negotiations, it is still unclear whether even high-level terms of a new voluntary deal will be agreed in time.

The pharmaceutical industry says financial uncertainties are a key reason why the English Innovative Medicines Fund (IMF) – offering the potential for time-limited funding for promising non-cancer treatments where benefits are uncertain at launch - has still not been used a year after it was put in place. Industry wants the National Health Service to share the financial risk of taking part in the fund.

Ipsen and other experts have criticized proposals from the UK government on changes to the statutory scheme for the pricing of branded medicines. Plans for differential rebates are seen as too complex, meaning their impact is difficult to predict and they could end up costing the government more.

Data provided to the Pink Sheet under freedom of information requests show the scale of patient access that has been delivered under the UK’s scheme for early access to products that have yet to receive a marketing authorization.

The UK’s generics and biosimilars industry body, the BGMA, has set out what it wants from the new drug pricing scheme due to start up in January 2024. But a key request – exempting some branded generics and biosimilars from rebates - would leave a hole in the government’s finances.

The UK pharmaceutical industry association, the ABPI, says it and the government are still far from reaching a deal on a new voluntary pricing agreement and has suggested that a transition to the statutory scheme could be on the cards if an acceptable deal cannot be secured.