Biologist and chemist Dr. Frans de Loos (1957) is one of the founders and directors of Fair Medicine, and has worked in the pharmaceutical industry for more than 20 years.

Why is Fair Medicine a good idea?
‘The way that the pharmaceutical world is developing, and the way that registration and compensation of medication is arranged today, needs a new stimulus. A new player like Fair Medicine can design alternative models and bring them up for discussion.’

Where do you see the most important bottlenecks in the current pharmaceutical market?
‘We know better how diseases occur, and more and more products for the patients are being developed and released. But the current model cannot deal with the volume. As a result, products are cancelled during the development process simply because they don’t fit into the current system. Moreover, the classical model results in prices that are too high for the products that manage to make it through the whole process.’

Based on your expertise, what can Fair Medicine mean for the pharmaceutical industry?
‘With its new business model, Fair Medicine helps new players enter the industry. By investing together, more parties can benefit from pharmaceutical development, and smaller companies can justify the investment in the development of new drugs. Plus, university hospitals, doctors and patients can also participate in the development of pharmaceuticals. This lowers the total cost of developing a drug, which means that products that would be cancelled in the current model could potentially be developed for the patients. If the Fair Medicine model is used for products that are currently too expensive, then it will contribute to making the pharmaceutical industry more future-proof.’