approval is not reimbursement, said patiently for the ninth time

The European channel spent a fortnight on the confusion it exists to correct. A drug being approved centrally and a drug being paid for nationally are different facts, and the gap between them is where every frustrating story in that channel lives. Members from six countries compared what they actually paid and the spread was larger than the currency differences explain.

• German members explained the practical cost difference between a private and a statutory prescription, which several non-German members had not understood at all.
• Polish and Nordic pricing sat at opposite ends of the same table, and the table was built from member-reported figures rather than list prices.
• Pharmacy supply gaps were reported in two countries and were unrelated to reimbursement, which complicated the neat story.
• Cross-border purchasing inside the single market was discussed at the level of what people had done, with import VAT included in the arithmetic.
• The channel updated its pin to make the approval and reimbursement distinction the first thing anybody reads.