Position paper - Ensuring resilient life sciences supply chains in Europe

As policymakers seek to strengthen supply chain resilience following the COVID-19 pandemic and global disruptions, many are focusing on localisation of production. While ensuring security of supply is critical, localisation may not improve resilience or access. Instead, global interconnectedness, collaboration and regulatory harmonisation are essential to ensuring reliable access to medicines and medical products across Europe.

The Critical Medicines Alliance initiative is a positive step toward addressing vulnerabilities in the supply of critical medicines. In the context of its work and based on the global experience of American life sciences companies, this paper calls for a balanced, multi-dimensional approach. When addressing EU production capacities, the Critical Medicines Act, highlighted in the Mission Letter for Commissioner-designate Olivér Várhelyi, should prioritise market attractiveness and avoid overburdening supply chains with additional bureaucratic hurdles. Rather than relying on local production, policies must encourage diversified global supply chains, regulatory flexibility and competitive procurement practices to ensure consistent access to medicines across the EU.

Key recommendations include:

• Promoting international collaboration to bolster global supply chain resilience;
• Maintaining open trade to avoid restrictive or protectionist measures that could inadvertently undermine supply availability;
• Enhancing regulatory harmonisation and flexibility to reduce costs and complexity for manufacturers; and
• Ensuring supply chain resilience through diversified production and sourcing strategies.

Open the position paper below for a comprehensive analysis of these critical issues and actionable recommendations to safeguard Europe’s healthcare systems.