Most bioscience activities are concentrated in six historic bio-clusters: Stockholm, Uppsala, Gothenburg, Linköping, Umeå in the north, and the Malmö-Lund area in the south, where pioneering scientific work at medical universities and research institutes (Karolinska, Uppsala, Lund, and Sahlgrenska) has lead to groundbreaking discoveries, inspiring the creation and successful development of life science companies such as internationally renowned Astra (merged with Zeneca into AstraZeneca), Pharmacia, Gambro (artifical kidneys), Elekta (gamma knife) and Nobel Biocare (dental implants). Some 250 biotech start-ups are now active in the Uppsala region alone.
Karolinska Institutet (KI) was founded in 1810 and is one of the top medical research universities in the world. Through research, training and information, KI contributes to improving human health. 2,000 researchers, 2,000 postgrad. students, and an additional staff of 1,000 people work at KI. In 1895 Alfred Nobel instituted KI as the nominating organization of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine.
Immunology, neurobiology, molecular biology & genetics, microbiology, biochemistry & biophysics, cell & developmental biology, and applied biotechnology & biophysics are areas of medicine where Sweden is among the top three nations in the world in # of published scientific papers per capita. Perhaps because more than 25% of Swedish MD's also have Ph.D.s. Moreover, Sweden is a source of original technology in all these fields.
High standards, excellent patient compliance, unique patient databases, highly skilled researchers, and close cooperation between hospitals and clinics make Sweden one of the world's most popular locations for clinical testing by companies like Merck, Bristol-Meyers Squibb, Pfizer, Schering-Plough, Eli Lilly and Parke-Davis. Because of its reputation for quality, Sweden is one of the few countries from which clinical test results are accepted by the US Food and Drug Administration.
Sweden's Medical Products Agency is well-known for combining scientific advice with scrupulous regulatory oversight and un-bureaucratic efficiency. The MPA is one of the three most frequently requested agencies to serve as "rapporteur" in the European Union's centralized procedure for optaining approval of products intended for use in all EU countries.
Sweden also has a long history of accurate and comprehensive medical record-keeping, providing researchers with unique resources of medical and genetic information through access to the most sophisticated computerized bio banks available in the world. The twin database is one example.
With bioinformatics already becoming a key success factor for the anticipated rapid development of new pharmaceuticals and diagnostics, Sweden's undisputed strength in information technologies should add synergistically to the R&D efforts of the bioscience companies active in this environment.
For further info about the health care system and social welfare in Sweden, go to the Health Care and Social Welfare section.
To learn more about Swedish biotech and the health care industry, please visit the websites to the right.