MoH bureau to monitor medicine prices

A bureau will be set up under the Ministry of Health to monitor the prices of medicines. Licensed vendors will be obliged to report the prices as they are fixed by the producer before they are allowed to import the medicines. The procedure is described in a new regulation adopted by the Government, Info-Prim Neo reports. For medicines imported from the CIS countries, prices fixed in Moldova will be compared to those fixed in Russia, Belarus or Ukraine, said Health Minister Vladimir Hotineanu. For European medicines, countries for comparison will be selected from a list that includes Germany, France, Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Lithuania and Poland. At least three European countries will be selected for comparison. Under the new regulation, producer prices will remain unchanged for a calendar year, unless there is a deviation of 5% or more in the exchange rate between the leu and the currency of the respective country. The Minister believes that this mechanism will prevent unjustified hikes in drug prices throughout the year as well as exaggerated markups. Markups may not be larger than 40% of the producer price as registered by the MoH bureau, with 15% for the importer and 25% for the drugstores.