Lilly CEO: Innovation will improve health care

FRANKFURT, Germany Innovation is the way to improve quality and access to health care while controlling costs, the leader of drug maker Eli Lilly said Thursday in an address in Germany.

Lilly chairman, president and CEO John Lechleiter appeared at the American Chamber of Commerce in Germany, saying that innovative medicines can further improve people’s health and replace more expensive treatments while providing economic benefits by generating research jobs. He also said societies should shift their thinking with regard to healthcare reform, “from an emphasis on cost an understanding of value.”

“New medicines to provide better treatment for the pandemic of diabetes, to alleviate the growing human and economic toll of Alzheimer’s disease or to address countless other unmet medical needs around the world could have dramatic positive impacts not only on the quality [of] human life, but also on the capacity of our healthcare systems and the costs they incur,” Lechleiter said.