One of the public policy areas I’m most interested to study is rare diseases. So, today’s question that I’m hoping to answer is – among countries with one or more approved gene therapy drugs, what is the insurance penetration in its population.
First step – which countries have an approved gene therapy drug? Here is a nifty picture from Frontiersorg.in which documents the countries in which 20 of the 22( as of August 2019) approved gene therapy drugs were developed.
What is the insurance penetration in these countries?
Disclaimers before we answer this question. For Europe, I further drilled down to the country in which the drug was developed. France is the leading country in the field of gene therapy within Europe and so I’m taking France to answer this question.
Insurance penetration in the population for these countries is in a range between 92-100%. The numbers for Russia are a little more difficult to ascertain – with compulsory state-backed medical insurance in the picture.
And lastly, what is the health insurance penetration number for India?
44% as of 2017.