The future of the European biomedical healthcare sector: Four scenarios

This report describes four scenarios for the European biomedical healthcare sector. These scenarios depict plausible hypotheses about the future and provide a tool for forecasting, analysing and formulating policy as well as for strategic planning in private companies and among social partners. In a rapidly changing and complex world where demand and supply opportunities change equally quickly, planning cannot rely on simple projections of past trends. Alternative views of the future can help to broaden our understanding of issues that need to be addressed today. Scenario methodology provides such alternative views by embracing the element of uncertainty inherent in the future.