Market for needle-free devices to shoot up to $2.49 billion
By HME News Staff
Updated Sun February 12, 2006
NEW YORK - A skyrocketing number of injuries and consumer demand for alternatives should push the market for needle-free injection systems and safety syringes to $2.49 billion by 2009, according to a new study by Kalorama Information, a market research firm.
Some sectors of the market are already growing in excess of 20% annually, states Kalorama.
Annual needle-stick injuries in the United States alone average 600,000 to 1 million. Estimates indicate that as many as 80% of injuries could be prevented with the use of needle-free devices and safety syringes, Kalorama reported.
Needle-stick injuries cost institutions over $3,000 per incident, even when no infection occurs, according to Kalorama.
That cost, coupled with patient fear of needles, and the resulting lack of compliance, should drive the market to grow by a compounded rate of 11% annually over the next four years, the firm stated.
Newer and safer ways of administering medication include insulin pens and mono-dose vaccine injectors.
"Certainly the development, testing, regulatory approval, and eventual mass manufacturing of such devices is not cheap, yet the costs need to be continually weighed against the greater benefit to global health," notes Joseph Constance, the study's author.
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