Realising the Full Potential of Biosimilars: Interviews with Three Key Opinion Leaders

Abstract

It is well documented that biosimilars have great potential to improve access to high-quality cancer care by offering less expensive biological drugs as a result of lower overall development costs than reference products. This has been shown to be the case in numerous examples, such as for the infliximab biosimilar in Norway; however, the overall impact of biosimilar use has been variable.1 In this supplement, three leading experts on biosimilars in cancer care give insights into a number of pertinent issues in the field, wherein there is currently substantial discussion and debate. These valuable insights were obtained from a series of interviews conducted between 19th September and 8th October 2018 by the European Medical Journal with Prof Huub Schellekens, Dr Paul Cornes, and Prof Martin Dreyling. The topics discussed include the extent to which biosimilars can improve access to quality treatment in the context of high cost cancer therapies and the ways in which the potential economic advantages that biosimilars offer can be applied back to health systems. Consideration is also given to the development of biosimilars and the ways in which this process can be simplified and made more cost-effective to result in less expensive products.