25 April 2016 - UK regulators are under pressure from Big Pharma as well as patients.

What is the value of a human life? It is one of the most fraught questions in public policy as governments around the world struggle with rising healthcare costs from ageing populations.

The answer matters not only to patients, taxpayers and insurers, but also to the pharmaceuticals companies seeking rewards for the medical advances that have helped double global life expectancy in the past century.

Nowhere is the debate more intense than in the UK, where budget pressure on the National Health Service has capped growth of the annual £12bn drugs bill and created tensions with the often competing interests of the pharma sector.

For more details, go to: https://next.ft.com/content/b034a38e-0abf-11e6-9456-444ab5211a2f