Twelve licensees already receive licenses to sell medicines outside pharmacies - State Service for Medicines
Licenses for the sale of medicines outside pharmacies have already been received by 12 licensees for 273 locations in 19 regions of Ukraine.
Andriy Dolhovsky, head of the State Service for Medicines Control and Licensing of the Department for Wholesale and Retail Trade in Medicines, announced this during a roundtable discussion at the Interfax-Ukraine news agency on Thursday, entitled "Medicines outside pharmacies: initial results, safety risks, and the future of the pharmaceutical market."
He noted that "a new segment of the pharmaceutical market has now been formed, covering 19 regions of Ukraine."
Specifically, there are currently no licensed locations in six regions of Ukraine: Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, Mykolaiv, Sumy, and Chernivtsi.
According to Dolhovsky, the SOCAR gas station chain has become the 12th licensee.
Other licenses currently held include OKKO, Ukrnafta (which holds licenses for four business entities), UPG, BRSM Nafta, and a company planning to install vending machines on a lease basis in one of the chains.
He also noted that not all companies that received a license have yet begun to carry out the relevant activities; they are "probably continuing to study where it is safest and most profitable to open."
Dolhovsky reported that during the first month of the permit for the sale of drugs outside pharmacies, the largest number of applications for such activities were submitted in Kyiv, Kyiv, and Lviv regions.
According to him, "the trend is that we already have eight locations in Zaporizhia region, two in Kharkiv region, and one network is actively opening in Dnipropetrovsk region."
Moreover, about 40% of the places of business are geographically located in villages and towns.
"The application process has slowed down a bit right now because we have some questions. Despite some easing of licensing requirements for gas stations, there are still some concerns, particularly regarding accessibility for people with disabilities and other people with limited mobility," he said.
The roundtable materials will be published on the Interfax-Ukraine news agency's homepage.