- Boehringer Ingelheim progresses to 6th place in the 2026 Access to Medicine Index
- Company performs above average across all three assessed areas, with significant progress in Governance of Access and Product Delivery
- Long-term health equity initiatives, partnerships, open innovation and stronger outcome measurement contribute to continued progress
Ingelheim, Germany – Boehringer Ingelheim has advanced to 6th place in the 2026 Access to Medicine Index (ATMI), continuing its rise from 13th in 2022 and 8th in 2024. This result recognizes the company’s sustained progress to improving access to healthcare in low- and middle-income countries and reflects an approach that increasingly combines access to medicines with stronger health systems, local capabilities and research partnerships.
Every two years the ATMI evaluates the efforts of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies and ranks the top 20 based on their efforts to improve access to medicine in low- and middle-income countries. Boehringer performed above average across all three areas assessed by the Index, with particularly strong progress in Product Delivery, the area with the highest weighting. This reflects strong advancement of the company’s approach to access, from expanding initiatives and long-term partnerships to open innovation and stronger impact measurements.
“Access to healthcare is not achieved through a single intervention. It requires long-term collaboration to strengthen research, healthcare capabilities, and enabling access to treatment in underserved communities, where significant gaps remain. Our progress in the ATMI is important recognition; however, what matters most is translating that progress into better health outcomes for more people,” said Augusto Muench, Head of Sustainability at Boehringer.
Highlighted progress in this year’s assessment includes:
- More comprehensive access strategies for cardio-renal-metabolic medicines, improving availability and affordability in low- and middle-income countries through approaches such as Access to Healthcare in Kenya.
- Long-term partnerships and capacity building initiatives in Sub-Saharan Africa, including the expanded partnership with the Botswana Vaccine Institute and support for social entrepreneurs and start-ups with focus on healthcare through business incubator and accelerator programs and impact investments.
- CRM Patient Africa, a long-term initiative launched in 2025 and currently underway in Kenya, Rwanda and Ghana, combining research capacity building, screening and diagnostics, healthcare professional trainings and efforts to support access to medicines.
- Growing global health initiatives, including Stop Rabies and Angels, continue to expand their reach. The Angels Initiative works together with ambulance crews, nurses, doctors, and hospitals to build stroke-ready networks and have reached over 28 million stroke patients to date.
- Open science through opnMe, strengthening R&D capacity through collaboration with academic researchers. Since the last assessment, research partners from countries covered by the Index have authored or co-authored over 15 new scientific publications.
- More robust outcome measurement supports stronger tracking and reporting and validates how access and health-system-strengthening initiatives are reaching more patients.
These achievements reflect the continued progress since Boehringer Ingelheim’s strategic pivot towards health equity in 2023. “Expanding access is only part of the picture. We also need to understand whether our work is delivering meaningful and lasting change,” shared Dr. James Kinniburgh, global MORE HEALTH lead at Boehringer. Adding, “Stronger measurement gives us the evidence to better understand what works, lessons learned to strengthen our approach and ultimately, direct our efforts where they can make the biggest difference.”
As Boehringer Ingelheim continues to advance its health equity strategy and initiatives, the company reaffirms its commitment to meaningful collaboration with global health organizations, local partners, and underserved communities to support greater accessibility and affordability to healthcare, worldwide.
About Boehringer Ingelheim
Boehringer Ingelheim is a biopharmaceutical company active in both human and animal health. As one of the industry’s top investors in research and development, the company focuses on developing innovative therapies that can improve and extend lives in areas of high unmet medical need. Independent since its foundation in 1885, Boehringer takes a long-term perspective. Our approximately 54,300 employees serve over 130 markets to build a healthier tomorrow. Learn more at www.boehringer-ingelheim.com.
About the Access to Medicine Index
The Access to Medicine Index analyses 20 of the largest research-based pharmaceutical companies with products for high-burden diseases in low- and middle-income countries. It ranks them on their efforts to improve access to medicine, identifies best practices, highlights where progress is being made and uncovers where critical action is still required. The Index is endorsed by over 145 investors, collectively managing assets worth over USD 22 trillion. It is published every two years by the Access to Medicine Foundation, an independent non-profit organisation funded by the Gates Foundation, the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust, Wellcome Trust, UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Learn more: www.accesstomedicinefoundation.org
Additional links
- Imagine – sustainability story hub | Boehringer Ingelheim | Boehringer Ingelheim
- https://www.boehringer-ingelheim.com/about-us/boehringer-ingelheim-invest-eur-500-million-sustainability-related-programs-and-health-partnerships
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