Medicines and Health Technologies
Pharmaceutical Policies
As part of the PAHO initiative on the renewal of primary health care, regional guidelines are being drafted for the development of pharmaceutical services as an integral part of health services based on primary health care.
Key Documents
- Servicios farmacéuticos basados en la atención primaria de salud. Documento de posición de la OPS/OMS [2013] (only in Spanish)
- Taller Servicios Farmace´uticos basados en Atencio´n Primaria en Salud (only in Spanish)
- Good Pharmacy Practices: joint FIP WHO Guidelines
Pharmaceutical Services Competencies
- Grupo Te´cnico para el desarrollo de competencias para los Servicios Farmace´uticos. Términos de Referencia, 2012 (only in Spanish)
- Formulario Descripción de Experiencias exitosas en desarrollo de competencias para los servicios farmacéuticos basados en APS (only in Spanish)
Links of interest
PAHO assists the Member States at the national and subregional level in the formulation, implementation, and evaluation of pharmaceutical policies as part of their health policies in order to guarantee equitable access to quality essential medicines and promote their rational, evidence-based use by health professionals and the community.
Through a participatory process with all actors from the pharmaceutical sector led by the Ministry of Health based on a situation diagnosis, discussion was promoted and a consensus was reached that lead to approval of pharmaceutical policy through an administrative act such as a ministerial resolution, presidential decree, or law (e.g., Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, the Dominican Republic and, more recently, Panama, where the policy has not yet been approved). In the case of the subregional policies, the policies of the Andean Community, MERCOSUR, and Central America are noteworthy.
Key Information
- How to develop and implement a national drug policy, 1998
- Report: Meeting on Essential Medicines, Lima Peru 2007 (only in Spanish)

- Medicines and Biologicals in the Americas: Adapting Global Strategies to the Regional Context
- 2000 WHO pharmaceutical policy guide. Need for a review (only in Spanish)
- Experiences with pharmaceutical policy indicators. Brazil (only in Spanish)
- Supporting Implementation of Pharmaceutical Policies
- Higlights on NMP NAF´s experience
- Contribution to pharmaceutical policy-making by universities. ISALUD Argentina (only in Spanish)
- Reporting on progress towards MDG Target 8.E
- Study of the impact of exclusion of health services on access to medicines. Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua (only in Spanish)
- Evaluation of the pharmaceutical policies in Mexico. An overview (only in Spanish)
- Monitoring the pharmaceutical situation in Colombia (only in Spanish)
- Indicators to Measure Pharmaceutical System Performance and Medicines Access
- Experiencies in the evaluation and development of instruments. Europe (only in Spanish)
Pharmaceutical Situation Reports
- Pharmaceutical Situation in the America Factbook on Level I Monitoring Indicators - 2007
- The Pharmaceutical Situation in the Caribbean: Structure and Process 2007 (solo en inglés)
- The Pharmaceutical Situation in the Caribbean: Factbook on Level I Monitoring Indicators 2007 (solo en inglés)
Transparencia en el sector farmacéutico
- Buena gobernanza del sector farmacéutico: instrumento de evaluación, 2010
- Buena gobernanza del sector farmacéutico: lucha contra la corrupción en la ordenación del sector y el suministro de medicamentos, 2010
- WHO Assessment Instrument: Measuring Transparency in the Public Pharmaceutical Sector, 2009 (solo en inglés
- WHO Framework for Good Governance in the Pharmaceutical Sector, 2008 (solo en inglés)
National and Subnational Pharmaceutical Policies

- Bolivia (only in Spanish)
- Brazil (only in Portuguese)
- Chile (only in Spanish)
- Colombia (only in Spanish)
- Ecuador (only in Spanish)

- Andean countries (only in English)
- Mercosur, Bolivia and Chile (only in English)
- Central America and Dominican Republic (only in English)
Generic Medicines Strategy
- Definicio´n de medicamento gene´rico ¿un fin o un medio? Ana´lisis de la regulacio´n en 14 pai´ses de la Regio´n de las Ame´ricas (only in Spanish)
- Guía para la Implementación de Estrategias de Medicamentos Genéricos en los Países de América Latina y el Caribe como Mecanismo para Mejorar el Acceso a Medicamentos (only in Spanish)
- Marco para la ejecución de los requisitos de equivalencia para los productos Farmacéuticos (only in Spanish)
Pharmaceutical Country Profiles

- Argentina
- Barbados
- Bolivia (only in Spanish)
- Dominica
- Dominican Republic (only in Spanish)
- El Salvador (only in Spanish
- Grenada
- Guatemala (only in Spanish)
- Panama (only in Spanish)
- pdf Paraguay (only in Spanish)
- Peru
- Saint Kitts and Nevis
- Saint Lucia
- Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
- Suriname
- Trinidad and Tobago
- Uruguay (only in Spanish)
VII Pan American Conference on Pharmaceutical Education
Read more: VII Pan American Conference on Pharmaceutical Education
According to WHO: "A national pharmaceutical policy is a commitment to a goal and a guide for action. It expresses and prioritizes the medium- to long-term goals set by the government for the pharmaceutical sector, and identifies the main strategies for attaining them. It provides a framework within which the activities of the pharmaceutical sector can be coordinated. It covers both the public and the private sectors, and involves all the main actors in the pharmaceutical field."
"A national pharmaceutical policy, presented and printed as an official government statement, is important because it acts as a formal record of aspirations, aims, decisions and commitments. Without such a formal policy document there may be no general overview of what is needed; as a result, some government measures may conflict with others, because the various goals and responsibilities are not clearly defined and understood."
Policy formulation, implementation, and evaluation
Information Resources
Pharmaceuticals services based on Primary Health Care
As part of the PAHO initiative on the renewal of primary health care, regional guidelines are being drafted for the development of pharmaceutical services as an integral part of health services based on primary health care.