Pharmacy

The Pharmacists Association on Thursday described as “illegal” a pilot scheme launched by the post office (ELTA), which allows customers to order medicines and have them delivered from pharmacies to their homes for 3 euros.

The pharmacists claim the law allows drugs to only be dispensed in pharmacies.

A price hike of up to 4% of over-the-counter drugs is expected, according to professor Ilko Getov, President of the Bulgarian Pharmaceutical Union.

The main reason for the increased prices is the expiration of the one-year drug price freeze moratorium, Bulgarian Telegraph Agency reports.

BELGRADE - The Medicines and Medical Devices Agency of Serbia (ALIMS) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and cooperation with the Federal Service for Supervision of Healthcare of the Russian Federation (Roszdravnadzor) on Friday.

An investigation by officers of the Financial Police has led to the detention of 11 people for allegedly issuing bogus prescriptions and illegally trading in medicines in the broader area of Karditsa, central Greece, police said on Thursday.

The 11 suspects have been linked to seven pharmacies in the area.

The History of Pharmacy Museum, Romania's first such institution, sits in the city of Cluj-Napoca, at No. 28 Union Square, and holds over 3,000 exhibits dating from the fourteenth century. The Transylvanian city of Sibiu has a similar museum.

New regulations aimed at lowering the public sector’s drug costs oblige pharmacists to offer their patients the cheapest version of the medicine containing the necessary active ingredient with offenders facing the termination of their contract with the country’s main healthcare provider, EOPYY.

An appeal is to be launched against the government’s policy of limiting spending on medicines to 2 billion euros this year, the Panhellenic Medical Association said on Wednesday.

The EU on Wednesday hit French drugs giant Servier with a huge 331 million euro fine for colluding to delay a cheaper generic version of perindopril, a popular blood pressure treatment.
      

Pharmacists are set to strike on Thursday to protest the government’s decision to slash their profit margins.

The action was recommended by the head of the Panhellenic Pharmacists’ Association, Kyriakos Theodosiadis, following a meeting of its members on Saturday.

Pharmacists’ average profit margins are to be slashed by more than 5 percentage points as part of Greece’s efforts to meet the reform targets it has been set to receive its next sub-tranche of bailout funding, Health Minister Makis Voridis said on Wednesday.