Key findings:

* The Access to Medicine Foundation’s major initiative is the Access to Medicine Index, which analyzes and ranks the access to medicine efforts of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies. The Access to Medicine Index 2010 ranks 27 pharmaceutical companies on their efforts to provide access to medicines, vaccines and diagnostic tests to people living in 88 countries. The Index covers 33 priority diseases, including neglected tropical diseases, as well as the 10 most important communicable diseases and the 10 most important non-communicable diseases in terms of their health burden in the countries covered by the Index.

* The report provides an overall ranking of companies, as well as ranking according to the seven technical areas covered by the indicators. It also analyzes industry trends in commitments, transparency, performance and innovation and provides report cards for each company.

* GlaxoSmithKline, Merck &Co. and Novartis emerged as the top-, second and third- ranking companies respectively. All have improved in their transparency, performance and commitments to access to medicine.

* Two companies - Pfizer and Gilead have significantly improved their ranking since the Index 2008. Both have shown increased focus on access to medicine issues and have launched several new initiatives.

* Ranbaxy, Cipla and Dr Reddy’s emerged as the top-ranking companies, in order. All have significant market presence in the Index Countries and carry out adaptive research for Index Diseases.