A national medicines policy sets out and prioritizes the government’s goals for the pharmaceutical sector over the medium and long term. It serves as both a commitment and a guide for action since it also identifies the main strategies by which to attain the goals.

Essential medicines are those that meet a population’s priority health needs. They are chosen based on disease prevalence, safety, efficacy and relative cost-effectiveness. A national essential medicines list forms the basis for pharmaceutical procurement and reimbursement. Such lists should be regularly evaluated and revised or expanded as needed.

The Access to Medicines and Health Technologies team supports countries to:

develop and put into effect national medicines and health products policies to increase access to quality medicines and other health products;

review and update the national essential medicines list via a multisectoral participatory process and based on standard treatment guidelines, to inform procurement at all levels of the health system as well as reimbursement;

establish and adopt national good governance for medicines programmes to improve the transparency, accountability, quality and integrity of the pharmaceutical sector; and

establish and adopt priority medical devices lists for programmes.