Ukrainian Pharmaceuticals Industry Develops Rapidly and Is Ready to Cooperate with the State

The state should involve pharmaceutical manufacturers into the process of reformation of the healthcare system, but a number of the rules of the game in the domestic pharmaceutical market should be changed for that. Such opinion was expressed by Dmytro Shymkiv, the Chairman of the Executive Board of the Management Company of the PrJSC Pharmaceutical Firm Darnitsa, during the Ukrainian Pharmaceutical Congress 2019.

“When we talk about the healthcare reform, we would like to hear how the Ukrainian pharmaceuticals industry can join the reformation process. Because we can help!” Dmytro Shymkiv noted.

Pavlo Kovtoniuk, Deputy Minister of Health of Ukraine, in his turn, announced the introduction of the state “Medical Guarantees Program” in 2020 which program will combine six main types of medical aid, including provision with medicinal products.

Pavlo Kovtoniuk: “The purpose of our reformation marathon is that the pharmaceutical market offer people more medicines they need and people don’t have barriers on the way to those medicines.”

Engagement of domestic pharmaceutical manufacturers into providing Ukrainians with essential medicines is possible not only through state programs, but also by improving the business climate, creating transparent and predictable conditions of the game, and ensuring the possibility of strategic forecasting.

“Today we procure most cancer drugs from abroad. Why don’t we raise a question of a strategic project, propose the Ukrainian and international pharmaceuticals industries build a manufacturing site here, in Ukraine? This is the matter of a dialogue with the state, when it guarantees the companies that will build such production facilities in Ukraine that their products will be consumed by the state on certain conditions,” Shymkiv gave the example of the possible cooperation.

In addition to that, in his opinion, the state should solve the problem of “evergreen patents”, when holders of patents for medicinal products groundlessly prolong their validity periods, creating obstacles for the domestic pharmaceuticals industry in provision of patients with necessary and affordable generics.

“Patent holders play the game when in order to preserve their monopolistic position in the Ukrainian market they don’t allow other manufacturers to start developing a similar product,” Dmytro Shymkiv explained, emphasizing that Ukrainian generics help to cut the expenses of patients on treatment substantially.

Serhii Ishchenko, Director of Proxima Research, having presented the results of the year 2018, noted: “88% of medicinal products consumption in the Ukrainian market falls on Ukrainians themselves, therefore the market of medicinal products consumption of Ukraine on the whole depends on the stability of income of citizens. Therewith, according to the results of the year 2018, the consumption of medicinal products turned the scales towards imported medicinal products by a small margin.”

Under such conditions the issue of the development of the Ukrainian market of generic medicinal products gains particular importance. According to Dmytro Shymkiv, speaking of the pharmaceutical market, we refer to patients, in the first place, since the pharmaceuticals industry has a social mission. If we take a look at the global trends, there is market regulation everywhere, in particular of the generic one, in order to reduce the prices, since generics are most affordable medicines for the majority of the population.

“Today a manufacturer may be represented in one segment with several medicinal products at once. State doesn’t regulate the situation in any way and it is difficult to work under such conditions for market operators,” he emphasized. “An agreement is to be signed with several companies on their obligations relating to manufacturing a certain product type. Thus the state ensures regulation and controls prices.”