The Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine has fined Sanofi-Aventis Ukraine LLC, a pharmaceutical company and distributors BaDM LLC and Optima-Pharm LLC UAH 139.094 million for supply of medicines in 2010-2011.

Authorized government official at the committee Svitlana Panaiotidi wrote on her Facebook page that Sanofi-Aventis Ukraine, being the sole importer of Sanofi medicines, is fined UAH 69.547 million, BaDM UAH 28.788 million and Optima-Pharm UAH 40.759 million.

Panaiotidi said that during the investigation lasted for several years it was established that Sanofi-Aventis Ukraine in 2010-2011 imported 174 medicines made by Sanofi Group, 27 of which did not have analogs and 147 had analogs of other manufacturers.

Sanofi medicines are used to treat arrhythmia, epilepsy, diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular and cancer diseases.

Panaiotidi said that Sanofi-Aventis Ukraine, BaDM and Optima-Pharm introduced special conditions for sales and discounts stimulating distribution of medicines that have lost patent protection and have many substitutes, thus, restricting sales of medicines that do not have substitutes or have a restricted number of substitutes.

"The committee proceeded from the fact that medicines are socially significant goods. Any restriction of competition has a significant negative impact on the end consumer. Any actions of large pharmaceutical companies, such as Sanofi-Aventis Ukraine, and the largest distributors, the purpose or effect of which is to restrict competition from cheaper generic medicines, that is, direct substitutes, will have a significant negative socioeconomic effect," the committee official said.

At the same time, referring to the practice of the European Commission, she said that when a generic drug is released to the market, its price is 25% lower than the price of original medicines, and after entering the generic market within two years, its price becomes 40% lower than the original price of the original medicines.

After the release of a generic to the market, the price of the original drug is reduced by almost 20%. There is a significant impact on market volume and market shares of participants.

"Under normal conditions, companies that produce generics receive about 30% of the market volume at the end of their first year on the market of the drug, and 45% at the end of the second year. During these anticompetitive concerted actions, the share of sales of generic drugs to end users was insignificant and did not grow considerably, despite the lower price compared to the original Sanofi drugs sold with a high markup," Panaiotidi said.