Pharmaceutical industry-led partnerships focused on addressing the global burden of non-communicable diseases: a review of Access Accelerated

Objective: In spite of the increasing number of global health partnerships led by biopharmaceutical companies, there is a paucity of information on the number, type, and role of partners. This paper aims to analyze partnerships carrying out company programs included in Access Accelerated, a new industry initiative, focused on addressing the global non-communicable disease burden.

Study design: Document review and content analysis.

Methods: We extracted data on the number, type, and role of partners from 63 company programs reported into the Access Observatory, a public platform for reporting on access-to-medicines programs, in 2017. We did a descriptive analysis of the proportion of partners by sector, institution, and location. We used the Fischer's exact test to analyze the relationship between the program strategies, disease focus, and countries with the type of program partners. Based on our empirical findings, we developed a typology of program partnerships, according to which we categorized each of the 63 programs.

Results: Programs worked with three partners on average, the majority of which were local governmental or non-governmental organizations (70%). Most programs focused on health service strengthening (83%), community awareness and linkage to care (81%), and health service delivery (60%). Twenty-six of the 63 programs (41%) worked with the local Ministries of Health while 25 (40%) partnered with disease-specific organizations, 21 (33%) with hospitals, and 16 (25%) with academic institutions. Partnering with the Ministries of Health was significantly associated with the use of a health service strengthening program strategy (P = 0.02). Partnering with a hospital (P = 0.004) or private sector partner (P = 0.0009) was significantly associated with a program disease focus on cancer. Seventy-nine percent of the programs were solely funded by pharmaceutical companies. According to our program typology, 40 (63%) programs partnered directly or indirectly with multiple implementing organizations, which delivered the program directly to beneficiaries.

Conclusion: Pharmaceutical companies play a leading role in funding Access Accelerated programs with local governmental or non-governmental organizations mainly involved in program implementation. A detailed and transparent reporting of the role of local stakeholders in agenda setting, planning, and coordination of programs is needed to ensure public trust and accountability of programs led by pharmaceutical companies. More research is needed to identify the partnerships that are particularly suitable to promote efficient implementation, evaluation, and reporting depending on the nature of the program and context.