PRAGUE, Aug 17 (NNN-CTK) – Czech Health Minister, Vlastimil Valek, and his Slovak counterpart, Zuzana Dolinkova, signed a memorandum of understanding yesterday, to enhance cooperation in medicines policy and medical devices.
The two countries agreed to collaborate on facilitating the faster entry of innovative medicines, as well as, new generic and biosimilar drugs into the market. They also committed to jointly engage in new projects, according to a statement from the Czech Ministry of Health.
Their cooperation will primarily focus on solving medicine shortages, parallel trade, reimbursement issues, the marketing of medical devices, and pharmaco-economic evaluation of health technologies, it said.
During their meeting in Slovakia, the ministers also discussed cross-border cooperation in emergency medical services and emphasised the importance of enabling the cross-border exchange of ePrescriptions between the two countries.
Valek noted that, patients can currently use a Czech ePrescription to obtain medicines in Poland, Croatia, Spain, Estonia, and Latvia. The Czech Republic is working to expand this capability to other countries as well, he said.
“We would greatly welcome Slovakia’s participation in the cross-border exchange of ePrescriptions. With the large number of Czech citizens who travel to Slovakia daily, or reside permanently, the ability to use this service would improve and simplify their lives,” Valek said.– NNN-CTK
