White Paper on Personalized Medicine

Personalised medicine aims to deliver the right medicine to the right patient at the right time.1 It targets treatments to patients that are most likely to benefit from them, in contrast to the traditional “one size fits all” approach to medicine development and prescription. Personalised medicine leads to improved clinical outcomes and better quality of life for patients, and it offers tremendous potential savings to our struggling healthcare systems. But we are only at the beginning of this journey. As EBE, the European trade association representing the voice of biopharmaceutical companies, we have developed this White Paper as a blueprint for transforming this promising future into a consistent medical reality for patients. The White Paper describes the challenges in delivering personalised medicine, from the classification of disease, the need for greater investment in e-health and big data infrastructure, to calls for effective regulatory science and access mechanisms for the benefit of patients. We, at EBE, believe it is a top priority to establish data privacy and protection laws which effectively protect patients while at the same time making pan-European research initiatives possible. Likewise, appropriate regulation needs to ensure access to reliable methods for correct diagnosis.