Distinguished guests, fellow members, ladies and gentlemen:

Distinguished Guests, Fellow Members, Ladies and Gentlemen: Good evening and welcome to the Hong Kong Association of the Pharmaceutical Industry’s 39th Annual Dinner. This year, we are privileged to have Dr. York Chow, the Secretary for Food and Health, as our honored guest, to share his views on healthcare. It is also HKAPI's great honor, to welcome friends and colleagues from the entire healthcare community, including Dr. P. Y. Lam and his team from the Department of Health, Dr. Allen Cheung and his colleagues from the Hospital Authority, Mr. Ivan Ng, chief of Pharmacovigilance and Pharmacoeconomics in Macau, as well as many distinguished physicians, pharmacists, scholars, and our business and trade support partners, including Ms. Connie Lau and her colleagues from the Consumer Council, Mr. David Hui from the Business Facilitation Division, our colleagues from Customs and Excise, Consulates and Chamber, as well as, Mr. Cheung Tak Hey from the Patients Alliance, and Legislators Dr. Joseph Li from the Legislative Council. I would like to extend a warm welcome to everyone who is joining our Annual Dinner this evening. ______________________ Jimmy Carter, the 39th President of the United States and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate in 2002, said “We must work together to improve healthcare for people around the world. The development of partnerships between the public and private sectors is among the most effective strategies to reach this goal.” I share Mr. Carter's belief that: -improving healthcare is an important shared goal, and that -creating sustainable partnerships between the public and private sectors is one of Tonight, I would like to celebrate together the partnerships we have established. According to research publicized by TNS in July 2007, the people of Hong Kong ranked medical care as their #4 priority concern that they want government to address. Among those Hong Kong people surveyed, 32% thought that improving healthcare delivery is an important issue for them. From this information, it is clear that the forthcoming debate on healthcare delivery in 2008 is a topic of critical importance. I believe that we in the pharmaceutical industry have an important role to play in both the debate and in the delivery of high quality healthcare. HKAPI represents more than 50 of the top R&D based pharmaceutical companies from around the world. Our mission is to ensure the expedient access of innovative and effective medicines to enhance health and provide a better quality of life to patients in Hong Kong and Macau. Throughout our 39 year history, HKAPI has committed itself to developing partnerships with all of you to accomplish our shared mission to improve healthcare delivery. In January 2007, we revised and updated our Hong Kong Code of Marketing Practices, which governs the behavior of our members. Our aim is to ensure that we uphold the highest ethical standards. Our new Code specifies what kind of promotional, entertainment and sponsorship activities are acceptable or not, and strengthens our complaints and grievances procedures. Our Code is fully in line with guidelines from the International Federation of the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association, and has become a kind of benchmark in Asia. We are proud, but certainly not complacent, concerning the steps forward that we made last year as an industry in this area. Our Association fully supports the initiative of the government to develop a sustainable healthcare delivery and financing system. One of our key concerns is that any future healthcare system provides "peace of mind" and high quality choices for people in Hong Kong, which is appropriate to our status as one of the most advanced, innovative and entrepreneurial economies in the world. "Peace of mind" may at first seem to be a somewhat vague concept. However, from a patient's perspective it is critically important to ensure that there is a “real” safety net for healthcare services which adequately provides for patients in need. In order to truly provide "peace of mind" for all people in Hong Kong, this safety net must be 1) predictable, 2) adequately funded and sustainable, and 3) accessible by all sectors and segments of society. Despite Hong Kong having one of the highest disposable incomes per capita in the world, our investment in healthcare currently accounts for only about 6% of our GDP. This reflects a significantly lower financial commitment to health than in the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States, where approximately 8%, 10% and 15% of GDP are allocated to healthcare, respectively. Last Monday, I expressed my view to the Legislative Council that the government's current level of funding allocated to the Hospital Authority is insufficient and does not allow for current and diverse needs to be met fully for all segments and areas of Hong Kong from Causeway Bay to Kowloon Bay to Tin Shui Wai. The government's current funding allocation to H.A. cannot and does not meet the requirements and needs of our rapidly aging population. Tensions for resources exist within the current system. There is a wide disparity in resources allocation for services and for new and innovative pharmaceutical products in different clusters: Hong Kong Island, Kowloon West, Kowloon East and the New Territories, for example. We understand that H.A. is currently reviewing what's working well and not so well with the current cluster system, and that they will report back to LEGCO some time in mid-year 2008. We fully support this initiative and look forward to sharing the views of HKAPI with H.A.'s independent panel in February. At the same time, the government of Hong Kong has recently benefited from a $300 billion surplus. Now is the time to invest more to adequately address healthcare needs, to resolve a key concern for the people of Hong Kong, as I mentioned earlier. We understand that the government plans to introduce a proposal to reform the Hong Kong healthcare delivery system in the near future. During the ensuing public debate period which follows the release of the proposal, all citizens of Hong Kong will have the opportunity to speak out and to say what kind of healthcare we want. For example, do we want the government to continue to try to fully subsidize public-sector healthcare at the current 97% level for in-patient costs and 87% for out-patient costs? Is that approach sustainable, and does it fully meet our needs? Or, do we want to pursue other viable alternatives to enhance the kind of healthcare and choices which are made available. These new alternatives, such as medical savings, require greater individual responsibility and contribution, and, in exchange, would make greater choices in medical services and pharmaceutical products available. Patient choice with variable co-payment structures is a common element of healthcare systems throughout the world, especially in relationship to the dispensing of new and innovative drug therapies. If introduced in Hong Kong, for example, a co-payment system for drugs could substantially reduce the cost considerations of HA to bring more new and innovative drugs to the general formulary and to make them more readily available. This would allow H.A. doctors to have more choices about what they are allowed to prescribe, and give patients more choices and say on their treatment. Transparency is a key factor to ensure that the delivery of healthcare to the public is predictable, sustainable and accessible. Increasing the transparency of payment schemes for services, in the public and private sector, will enable patients to make better choices. The Association fully supports H.A.'s recently announced initiative to publicize on their internet site the waiting times for various types of elective surgeries at H.A. hospitals. This initiative gives the people better information to choose whether to wait for surgery at a minimal cost at some date in the future at an H.A. facility, or to seek such care more quickly at a private facility at greater cost. I also want to spend a minute to address an important issue in services fulfillment in the private sector, which is related to transparency, professionalism and fairness for the benefit of patients. Currently, private-sector physicians are allowed to prescribe and dispense medicines, and to earn a significant profit from doing so. The Association believes that healthcare professionals should only provide those services which are fully in line with their professional training. In other words, physicians should diagnose and prescribe needed drug therapies for their patients, and community pharmacists should provide services on drug dispensing and drug consultation in line with their professional training. It is clearly not in the best interests of patients to mix the two, as we currently have in Hong Kong. Many countries around the world, including those in Asia, have already moved to allow drugs, excluding vaccines, to be dispensed by registered pharmacists only to prevent a potential conflict of interest and to enhance drug handling. The Association, not to mention patient and pharmacist groups, would welcome a move
in this direction in Hong Kong
The war against counterfeit drugs is another area where HKAPI has been hard at work.
Together with many of our friends who are here tonight, we have undertaken many
initiatives to combat the availability of fake drugs in Hong Kong. During my tenure as
president of this Association these past two years, it has been widely reported in local
newspapers that counterfeits of the following products have been found available for sale
in Hong Kong pharmacies:
Cialis ®, Cytotec®, Lipitor ®,Plavix®, Ponstan ®,Propecia ®,Reductil®,Viagara,
and others.

The availability of counterfeits of these products constitutes a serious public safety risk.
Counterfeit drugs are usually manufactured in poor quality and often unsanitary facilities,
with substandard quality and materials. Further, the actual amount of active ingredient
contained in each counterfeit pill can be extremely variable. Some counterfeits contain no
active ingredients at all, while others may contain three, five times or even more of the
approved amount of active ingredient.
Over the past months and years, we have collaborated with the Consumer Council, and
have conducted campaigns with our trade partners, such as pharmacies and chain stores
to increase public awareness about the dangers of counterfeit drugs. We have also worked
closely with Customs and Excise and the Department of Health in combating counterfeit
drugs at the enforcement level.
Last year, we developed an anti-counterfeit task force within HKAPI to increase the level
of cooperation and collaboration across the pharmaceutical industry. In the past, our
efforts were usually taken by individual companies. However, this new task force
includes as members the security officers from most of the major pharmaceutical
companies. This task force now shares facts and figures, information about court cases,
and works with C&E together as a united front against counterfeit drugs.
Recently, we have also begun work with C&E to conduct more frequent proactive raids
of local pharmacies suspected of selling counterfeit drugs. I believe that all of these
initiatives represent steps forward in the fight together against counterfeit drugs.
Our analysis of the Hong Kong data indicates that the low penalty for selling counterfeit
products is probably one of the key reasons that counterfeit pharmaceuticals remain an
ongoing problem here. Countries like China and Taiwan have drastically increased
penalties for manufacturing, trafficking and selling counterfeit drugs in recent years, even
in small quantities. This new "Zero Tolerance" approach is quite different from our
situation in Hong Kong, however, where a conviction for counterfeiting generally results
in minimal fines of only 2,000 to 20,000 Hong Kong dollars in our courts. Assigning a
very low penalty for such a serious offense and threat to public safety has not created a
deterrent effect to those who commit the crime of counterfeiting. The Association
advocates that penalties for the counterfeiting of drugs be substantially increased to the fullest limits of current Hong Kong law. We are very fortunate to have Dr. York Chow here with us at this dinner. I would like to thank him for taking time out of his schedule to speak to us tonight. I would also like take this opportunity to call for Dr. Chow's Food and Health Bureau to consider including a section on drug safety as a part of an expanded Food Safety Bill that he and his team are currently preparing. I truly value the partnership we have developed in the past few years. As we begin to debate the pros and cons of various alternative proposals and scenarios on healthcare, I believe that 2008 will be seen as an important year to chart the future direction for the delivery of healthcare in Hong Kong. Next year, HKAPI will celebrate its 40th anniversary. The members of the Association and I look forward to a special celebration with you in January 2009. At that time, 12 months from now, we will again have a chance to review how far forward we will have moved in 2008 to accomplish the important general initiatives I have just outlined in healthcare delivery, services fulfillment based on professional training for healthcare providers in the private sector, and anti-counterfeiting. Additionally, we can review progress on HKAPI's specific requests to the government and its affiliated constituencies and agencies to 1) allocate more funding to healthcare, 2) increase transparency in payment systems in both public and private sectors, 3) increase the penalties given to persons convicted of counterfeiting, and 4) consider to include drug safety as part of an expanded Food Safety Bill. Thank you for your attention, and for coming to our annual dinner tonight. Please enjoy our time together this evening.

Source: http://www.hkapi.hk/images/newsletter/Speech_of_President.pdf