US and UK set to agree zero tariffs deal on pharmaceuticals

A major deal between the UK and the US to lower proposed tariffs on pharmaceuticals to zero is expected imminently.

Pharmaceutical industry sources have told the BBC that a deal to lower planned tariffs on medicine imports into the US could be announced as soon as today.

The deal comes after several pharmaceutical giants decided to either reduce spending in the UK or increase their US investments following threats of tariffs as high as 100% on branded drug imports.

Pharmaceuticals are one of the UK's biggest exports to the US, which is also the biggest market by far for big UK drugmakers including GSK and AstraZeneca.

In the 12 months to the end of September, the UK exported £11.1bn worth of medicines to the US, making up 17.4% of all goods exports in that period, according to the Department for Business and Trade.

The deal is expected to see the UK increase the price threshold at which it deems new treatments to be too expensive by 25%, while increasing the overall amount the NHS spends on medicines.

In the agreement, UK medicine exports will be protected from tariff increases for the next three years.

A long-running row between the industry and UK government over spending levels and approval rates was intensified by the Trump administration's insistence that US customers were paying several times more for drugs than people in the UK and Europe.

Several large pharma investments in the UK have been paused or cancelled over the last 18 months while both GSK and AstraZeneca have recently announced multi-billion-dollar investments in the US.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting said in August that he was not prepared to let drug companies "rip off" the UK, but subsequently Science Minister Sir Patrick Vallance told the BBC he accepted that the NHS needed to spend more on medicines after seeing its spending on drugs shrink as a percentage of its budget over the last 10 years.

In mid-September, British pharmaceutical giant GSK pledged to invest $30bn (£22bn) in research and manufacturing in the US over the next five years.

A week before GSK's US investment announcement, US pharmaceutical company Merck - which is called MSD in Europe – revealed it was scrapping its planned £1bn expansion of its UK operations.

Shortly after, AstraZeneca also announced it was pausing a planned £200m investment in a Cambridge research facility. In July, AstraZeneca said it would invest $50bn on medicine manufacturing and research and development in the US.