Pharmaceutical companies and pharmacies applied to VCCI

Russian manufacturers may stop producing cheap, low-margin medicines. Representatives of pharmaceutical companies announced this at a meeting held at the Vyatka Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The issue is that a pilot project for labeling all medicines produced in Russia will launch next year. Starting January 2018, this measure will become mandatory for all manufacturers.

Olga Gordienko, Director of the Kirov branch of JSC "AVVA RUS," noted that labeling is a necessary and correct measure, as every manufacturer is interested in ensuring the end consumer receives exactly the drug it produced and for whose quality it is responsible. "This measure has been in effect for about six years in many countries, including India," she said. "And all civilized countries will gradually come to this step. But in our case, the issue is very acute because there is extremely insufficient time for an adaptive period."

Heads of other pharmaceutical enterprises supported their colleague. "Many technical questions arise," said Alexander Pinkus, a representative of "NanoLek." "Many of our machines are under warranty, and if we install new coding equipment into them, we will simply lose it. Another problem is the 'bugginess' of the system, which, by the way, hasn't even been developed yet. And like any IT product, it will need to undergo serious testing. In our case, such a 'glitch' leads to a production stoppage, meaning serious losses."

Equipping one automated machine with the necessary devices will cost from 100 to 200 thousand dollars. "This depreciation will ultimately be reflected in the cost of the product, which, by the most minimal estimates, will increase by 10 to 15%," said Timur Nutfullin, General Director of LLC "Apteka No. 1."

"Furthermore," Olga Gordienko noted, "it's not entirely clear how pharmacy points in remote villages without internet, or, say, FAPs (Feldsher-Midwife Stations), will dispense such drugs. Imagine, a doctor brings medicine to a grandmother somewhere in a village, and she must get a smartphone and, essentially, perform a payment operation."

"Moreover," joined Stanislav Fedotovsky, General Director of JSC "Kirov Pharmaceutical Factory," "the delivery and installation of the equipment will take at least six months, and naturally, we will prioritize doing this on machines that produce more expensive medicine. And there will simply be no point in producing low-margin drugs, meaning those that cost up to 50 rubles. It will be easier for us to abandon their production altogether."

The category of low-margin drugs includes most of the so-called VED list (Vital and Essential Drugs): antibiotics, cardio, hypotensive, and other drugs.

Following the meeting, the participants decided to appeal to the relevant federal authorities with a proposal to postpone mandatory drug labeling until at least 2019, and also to inform the acting governor of the Kirov region, Igor Vasilyev, about this meeting.