The Swiss drug and diagnostics company, Roche, is investing in Colombia’s health system with $240 million in diagnostic facilities and health care education over the course of five years.

The History of Roche

Founded in 1896, Roche is one of the world’s largest and oldest biotech companies. Its founder, Fritz Hoffmann-La Roche, launched the company in Basel, Switzerland, with the idea that manufacturing improvements from the industrial revolution could be beneficial in fighting disease. 

Roche pioneered 32 of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) List of Essential Medicines. In 1962, it introduced the first anti-cancer drug, Fluorouracil. In the mid-1990s, Roche developed a series of drugs for cancer treatment, including Herceptin for metastatic breast cancer and MabThera as a life-extending treatment for leukemia. Roche developed new diagnostic tests and automatic analyzers in 1968, setting up service laboratories to process the data.

Roche currently has facilities in more than 100 countries and provides services such as: 

• In vitro diagnostic testing.
• Clinical decision support.
• Digital diagnostics.
• Disease management.
• Laboratory automation.
• Software solutions for integrating laboratories and health care systems. 

Colombia’s Health System

The WHO ranks Colombia 22nd in the world for health care system efficiency, above the United States, Canada and Australia. A 1991 legislation, Law 100, extended universal health coverage to the majority of the population, making key reforms in Colombia’s health system. Public health care coverage rose to 65% of the population in the following decade.

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) Health at a Glance 2023 report reveals that 95% of the Colombian population has access to health care services. However, only 41% report being satisfied with the services that they receive. Additionally, Colombia has a shortage of health care professionals, with 2.5 practicing doctors and 1.6 practicing nurses per 1,000 people. OECD suggests 3.7 practicing doctors and 9.2 practicing nurses for optimal population coverage.

Despite the efficiency of Colombia’s health system and its work on universal health care, the lack of financial sustainability, inequity of care in rural areas, fragmentation of the system and limited investment in primary health care detract value from it. Many of Colombia’s aging citizens with chronic diseases suffer from an unequal distribution of an already limited number of health care workers.

Approximately 88% of Colombia is rural, with limited access to health care, increased violence and greater levels of poverty — factors that contribute to disease. Within the country, 10.6 million people live more than 60 minutes away from the nearest hospital, and 63.6% of those people live in rural regions. Colombia’s most isolated region requires 5-11% of a person’s monthly wage and over three hours of travel to reach the nearest hospital.

Roche’s Investment in Colombia’s Health System

In 1957, Roche founded its affiliate in Bogotà, Colombia, marking the beginning of a decades-long investment in Colombia’s health system. In 2022, Roche performed 168 million diagnostic tests and 731,000 treatments in the country.

This year, Roche announced that it will be investing a total of $240 million into Colombia’s health system over the next five years. Roche recently invested $40 million in a new distribution center just outside of Bogotà. The company is confident that its investments will provide safe, high-quality and effective health care to Colombians. Its focus includes work on pathologies with high public health impact and providing care to populations that have been neglected. 

Working with stakeholders in the country, Roche hopes to reduce inequalities in health care access by providing educational programs on disease prevention and self-care to populations with limited access to health care. Additionally, Roche’s Pink Offices in Colombia employ visually impaired women with heightened senses of touch to assist in breast cancer screenings — offering financial independence for a marginalized population, encouraging greater community involvement in health care and increasing early diagnosis rates.

Concluding Remarks

Roche’s $240 million investment in Colombia’s health system is a continued promise of the company’s work in the country. The company is providing quick, efficient and safe health care to patients across Colombia, combatting existing inequality in health care access. Its continued investment in Colombia has the potential to decrease disparities in disease management with greater diagnostic tests and treatments.

– Komalpreet Kaur
Photo: Flickr