Reference prices: The Spanish way

The aim of this paper is to analyse the effects of recent regulatory reforms implemented in the Spanish pharmaceutical market: the promotion of generic drugs and the implementation of reference prices. The objectives of such reforms are twofold: firstly, to increase price competition and secondly, to reduce public pharmaceutical costs. This paper shows that for the Spanish method of implementing reference prices to achieve these objectives, compared to a situation with copayments, requires the reference price to be set in a certain interval. In addition, the Spanish system may result in profits for the branded and generic producers being reduced