French government seeks to spur employment and research in healthcare

Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin called the second meeting of the Strategic Council for the Healthcare Industry in late April. This strategic council includes six industry heads: Jean-Luc Belingard (Ipsen), Ernesto Bertarelli (Serono), Jean-Francois Dehecq (Sanofi-Aventis), Jean-Pierre Garnier (GSK), Pierre Le Sourd (BMS) and Yves L'Epine (Takeda) and four French ministers - Philippe Douste-Blazy (Health), Thierry Breton (Finance), Patrick Devedjian (Employment) and Francois d'Aubert (Research).

The Council adopted a "common vision" of the strategic goals for the healthcare sector. It stressed the importance of creating value in health industries for the future. The major healthcare companies, already established in France and members of the Strategic Council, have announced their intention to increase their research spend in France; they also intend to hire 50,000 new employees over the next three years, with 6,000 of them going into newly created jobs.

The Council approved a set of performance indicators to measure the attractiveness and competitiveness of France as a focus for health industries. These indicators include the:

availability of high-skilled workforce,

number of new medical solutions developed by French laboratories,

total r&d expenses in the French public and private sectors in comparison with other countries.

The Strategic Council expressed satisfaction with the measures taken by the government to encourage research and innovation. One of the key initiatives is a reduction in the tax rate on patent fees from 19% to 15% (representing a cost of about Euro 250m), which gives France the lowest rate in Europe.

The Council made a number of operational decisions, including:to increase the attractiveness of France for pharmaceutical research and production: the Comite Economique des Produits de Sante (Economic Committee for Health Products - CEPS) will take into account each laboratory's industrial presence in Europe and in particular its Europe-based r&d activities, when calculating rebates, whether contractual or of other kinds (at constant cost);

to support technological research in healthcare: the bio-production project of the Laboratoire de Fractionnement Biologique (LFB) at Toulouse (€50m); a preclinical imaging platform (ImagEne: €19m); and a network of biological specimen collections that will be accessible to everyone involved in r&d (€5m);

to increase France's attractiveness as a place for clinical studies and trials, by creating trial management centres for health products in teaching hospitals (CEGEPS);

to provide incentives for the development of paediatric medicines and paediatric forms of medicines already marketed for adults.

The Invest in France Agency (IFA) is working together with the French government to attract new investment in the healthcare sector. IFA aims to highlight the new initiatives that will facilitate job creation and research activities.

Clara Gaymard, head of Invest in France, said: 'It is vital that we continue to attract global pharmaceutical companies to France, and increase the competitiveness of France by pursuing our r&d efforts.'

The Prime Minister has requested the Strategic Council meet again within six months to progress three areas: tax aspects of innovation; the application of the research law and the setting-up of competitiveness centres in this sector; and the economic regulation of medicines.

The Prime Minister created the Strategic Council on 29th September 2004. Its role is to improve the attractiveness and competitiveness of France for pharmaceutical laboratories, biotechnology companies and other firms in the healthcare sector.