'Global drug sales over 5 yrs augur well for generics'

The global pharmaceutical market will grow 4-6 per cent next year, exceeding $825 billion, 1 per cent more than its earlier prediction, according to IMS Health, a global drug sales tracking agency.

Its analysis predicts the global drug sales scenario over five years will augur well for generic or reverse-engineered cheap version drug makers.

Global growth will be 4-7 per cent each year through 2013. The ‘pharmerging markets,’ which include China and India, are expected to grow12-14 per cent in 2010, and 13-16 per cent over five years.

This was despite economic conditions significantly affecting some markets like Russia, Turkey, South Korea and Mexico, said the agency. The four Bric countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China), apart from Turkey, Korea and Mexico, are considered the ‘pharmerging markets,’ which has seen the highest growth recently.