“The percentage of generic drugs among all pharmaceuticals purchased was 33.5% by volume and 12.4% by sales in 2015, which is substantially lower than in other developed countries, including the USA, the UK, and Germany at 91.9%, 75.0% and 84.8% by volume, respectively (Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, 2016h, 2017c).Brand-name pharmaceuticals receive market protection for a long time in Japan, and generics are not widely used after patent expiration. Recent government policies have been developed to improve the rates of generic substitution, and promotion of generic drugs has formed one of the centrepiece in the effort to reduce medical expenditure (Iizuka T et al., 2011).”
Source: Sakamoto H, Rahman M, Nomura S, Okamoto E, Koike S, Yasunaga H et al. Japan Health System Review. Vol. 8 No. 1. New Delhi: World Health Organization, Regional Office for South-East Asia, 2018.
“The health-care benefits for the population on public assistance (living below poverty line) is 100% financed by government subsidies. This segment of the population has been growing since 1995, from 882 229 (0.7% of total population) in 1995 to 2 165 895 (1.7%) in 2014. The amount of health expenditure paid on behalf of this population accounted for 4.2% of THE in 2014 (Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, 2016p). In order to limit a further increase in health-care spending for the population on public assistance, the MHLW is currently proposing four areas of priority for subsidizing the poor: promoting the use of generic medicines, reducing polypharmacy, dis-incentivizing frequent use of health-care facilities, and implementing appropriate control of NCDs (Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, 2017l).”
Source: Sakamoto H, Rahman M, Nomura S, Okamoto E, Koike S, Yasunaga H et al. Japan Health System Review. Vol. 8 No. 1. New Delhi: World Health Organization, Regional Office for South-East Asia, 2018.
“A shift in financial incentives can support development or choice of less resource-intensive care. In Japan, additional fees are provided to hospital EDs to encourage patient discharge to primary care clinics (Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare 2014).”
Source: OECD (2017), Tackling Wasteful Spending on Health, OECD Publishing, Paris. dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264266414-en
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Page last updated March 31, 2025 by Doug McVay, Editor.