The Commission’s Paper on the Obligation of Continuous Supply of Medicines and it’s Impact on Parallel Exporting Activities in The EU: A Paradigm Shift?

By Gonçalo Miguel Banha Coelho 

This paper seeks to shed some light on the impact of the European Commission’s Paper obligation of continuous supply of medicines in typically parallel exporting countries. It is argued that the Commission’s initiative on this domain represents a backtracking from its previous liberal approach to arbitrage in parallel export cases, in particular, through the use of competition rules to foster Internal Market goals. Recent initiatives by the Portuguese ph