1、 itif.org Lessons From Europes Loss of Biopharma Leadership,and Its Attempts to Recover SANDRA BARBOSU,STEPHEN EZELL,AND ESTHER SERGER|MARCH 2026 Europe once led the world in biopharmaceutical innovation,but it lost ground after adopting policies that weakened incentives for R&D and innovation.Ameri
2、ca must learn from Europes experience to preserve its own biopharma leadership and the related economic benefits and access to the most innovative drugs.KEY TAKEAWAYS Europes biopharmaceutical leadership eroded due to detrimental policy choices such as stringent price controls that weakened innovati
3、on incentives.Global leadership then shifted to the United States,which had developed a more supportive environment.Price controls come with major costs.Europes policies led to fewer new drugs,delayed drug launches,reduced R&D investment,and large losses in high-value life sciences jobs.For patients
4、,time to availabilitymeasured from regulatory approval to payer coveragewas longer in 25 of 27 EU countries than in the United States;in 22 of 27 EU countries,median delays for novel treatments exceeded one year.Current U.S.policy proposalsincluding expanded price controls,tariffs on medicines and a
5、ctive pharmaceutical ingredients,erosion of IP protections,and cuts to federal funding for basic researchthreaten the ecosystem underpinning U.S.leadership.Conversely,policies to spur investments in advanced manufacturing,encourage public-private partnerships,and ensure more equitable global cost sh
6、aring can boost innovation without harming patient access or costs.To strengthen its position in biopharmaceuticals,Europe has recently introduced several policy initiatives,including the“Choose Europe”campaign to attract global research talent and reforms in Germany to move away from international