Russia increases procurements of high-priced original anti-HIV drugs

The Russian Ministry of Health spent more than 26.1 billion roubles ($351 million) on the procurements of drugs against HIV this year, an increase of 10% compared with the year earlier, according to recent statements by Ministry’s press-service, reports The Pharma Letter’s local correspondent.

While most of the funds were spent on expensive original drugs, the total number of purchased drugs has significantly decreased.

According to experts of Headway Company, one of Russia’s pharma analytics agencies, the largest procurements were accounted for by Moscow and St Petersburg. At the same time purchases of drugs by regional authorities decreased by 41.6%, to only 2.1 billion roubles on year-on-year basis.