The medicine market: continuous growth
In 2012, the medicine market was valued at over 880 million dollars. The forecast for 2014 stands at 1,000 billion dollars. It is a constantly developing market boasting a 400% increase in 10 years.
The main consumers of medicines are North America and Europe (over 60% of the market). The United States are the greatest consumers of medicines with 38% of the global market. The European market (18% of global figures) is dominated by Germany and France.
Heat-sensitive medicines
The pharmaceutical industry regularly grows by 6% every year. This can be explained by the increase in the number of people suffering from diseases and health issues such as:
- Diabetes: there are 171 million diabetics in the world, and this figure should double by 2030.
- Obesity: 1.4 billion people are obese and this figure should reach 3.3 billion by 2030.
- Cancer: 1 woman in 20 has breast cancer. 1 man in 12 has cancer.
- Alzheimer's: 18 million people suffer from Alzheimer's and this figure should reach 35 million by 2025.
Treatments are developed for these growing illnesses. The percentage of heat-sensitive medicines will also grow, for several reasons: pharmaceutical lab mergers/acquisitions, development of R&D departments, 40 to 60% of patents entering the public domain, strong growth of the global generic market (availability for patients of targeted products developed by biotechnology), etc.
Temperature-controlled packaging solutions for shipping heat-sensitive medicines
On the one hand, pharmaceutical companies must choose high-performance cold chain packaging that guarantees the medicinal properties of the products shipped. The Frizbox® temperature-controlled pallet shipper guarantees cold chain integrity for shipping large volumes all over the world.
On the other hand, it is important to inform patients and equip them for the correct transportation of their heat-sensitive medicines. The Nomad® range is specifically designed for them (insulated pouch, cooling bag…).