COVID-19 Amplifies Europe's Reliance on Foreign Critical Drug Supplies, an Industrial Info Market Brief

Europe, like the U.S., has relied heavily on foreign production of essential drug products. An estimated 90% of all active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) are imported from China and India. Long before COVID-19 reared its head, supply problems existed, including major quality issues and fears of drug shortages.

COVID-19 merely underscored the weakness in the current supply-chain strategies. Like the U.S., Europe is now taking a serious look at bolstering its domestic production, not only for APIs, but for finished drug products as well. Even for the advanced biological manufacturing plants that already produce APIs and bulk products domestically, many of the raw ingredients come from China and India.