Brexit could directly damage the UK pharmaceutical industry, according to NonStop Recruitment.
Brexit pharma
An analysis by the specialist pharmaceutical and life sciences recruitment consultancy claims that the UK leaving the EU would mean the sector would still have to follow regulations to sell in the single market, but that it would have no say over what these regulations were.
It would also mean the UK would lose out on the greater patent protection and support for research that it currently gains from being a member state, as well as the expertise of thousands of highly skilled professionals, according to the firm.
Matt Beedle, a team leader at NonStop's pharma division said:
“From our analysis and the many others that have been released it’s clear that the pharmaceutical and life sciences fields would be directly impacted in the case of a Brexit.
"Yes, the situation isn’t perfect at the moment however, the outlook would still be far worse if we were to vote leave.
"In this instance there’s a high chance that the EMA (European Medicines Agency) would relocate and therefore many of the pharma companies headquartered in the UK could leave – potentially to Ireland.
"This is because one of the major reasons many pharma firms have their headquarters in the UK is due to the proximity of the London-based EMA.
"In addition we’d still need to trade in the single market, however we would no longer have any say in what regulations we would be following, which would obviously damage our competitiveness and would likely weaken our position significantly.
"The sector would also struggle to keep hold of the thousands of European professionals who currently provide expertise to firms on these shores.
"We have such a powerful industry here that it seems like a huge error to leave, particularly at a time when our industrial output is growing at its fastest rate for four years, which has been heavily boosted by the pharma sector.
“For NonStop as a business a leave vote would be particularly unwelcome.
"We place a big focus on providing the best possible working environment, part of which involves allowing our employees to work in any of our offices across Europe.
"A Brexit would mean we would face a much larger administrative burden in order to continue having a diverse workforce, something which we know directly contributes to our success as a business.
"And it’s not just us that would be affected, the knock on effects would impact all UK businesses that utilise the expertise of European professionals.”