Russian labeling a major concern for pharma industry, says ARPM

The drug labeling experiment began in Russia at the beginning of 2017, the goal of which is to increase the transparency of the movement and accounting of medicines, to exclude counterfeit products from circulation. This is now the number one topic in nation’s pharmaceutical industry, and the number of those who doubt the successful launch of labeling is increasing every day, according to a web posting by theAssociation of Russian Pharmaceutical Manufacturers (ARPM)

Viсtor Dmitriev, general director of the ARPM, speaking at the annual conference “Labeling in the pharmaceutical industry,” noted that “the law said that data would be donated, we hope it will be like that. But in the course of the experiment a sum of 50 kopecks appeared, plus VAT for one code. On the one hand, the amount is small, but in the total volume of the drug market this is 3.5 billion roubles ($54.4 million)a year. ”

So according to the head of the National Association the APM, Nadezhda Daragan, “a manufacturer of a medium-sized enterprise, when producing about 40 million packages a year, will have to pay about 20 million roubles(~$310,000) plus 2 million roubles of VAT for the provision of marking codes. This amount will lead to the fact that the production of drugs will be removed from the lower price segment, which will become unprofitable. In addition, in connection with the current situation, there will be some job cuts.”