Multinational drug companies, now looking forward to a sustained boom in the Chinese market, should instead be bracing themselves for a collapse in profits over the next few years. So concludes a new report by Bain & Company, an American management consultant. China is already the world's third-biggest market, behind only America and Japan, and is likely to consume $75 billion-worth of medicines this year. Sales have been growing at a compound annual rate of nearly 25% since 2009. Rising incomes and rapid ageing mean that demand for drugs should continue soaring. The expansion of publicly funded health insurance should also, in theory, bolster demand.
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