OREANDA-NEWS. September 28, 2011. The Commission of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia) found that the Ministry of Health Care of the Sverdlovsk Region violated Parts 1 and 3 Article 15 of the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition”, reported the press-centre of FAS Russia.

FAS Commission concluded that the Ministry violated the law by issuing No.2038-p Order “On the Procedures for Quality Control of Medicines in the Sverdlovsk Region” of 18th November 2008 that unreasonably prevented economic activities of companies. The Order set requirements to economic entities that were not provided for by the law of the Russian Federation and restricted their tights for selling and buying goods. Also the Order assigned the functions and rights of the bodies of state control and supervision to the “Centre for Quality Control and Certification of Medicines” State Budget-Funded Health Care Organisation of the Sverdlovsk Region.

FAS initiated the case against the Ministry of Health Care of the Sverdlovsk Region on 1st August 2011 upon petitions from the Union of Professional Pharmaceutical Organisations and “SIA INTERNAITONAL LTD” CJSC. Petitioners informed about the so-called “entry control” of medicines quality in the Sverdlovsk region. As a result of the “entry control”, wholesale suppliers of medicines were forced to submit samples of the medicines brought in the Sverdlovsk region to the “Centre for Quality Control and Certification of Medicines” to undergo quality examination for the purposes of registration in the database of the Unified Data Retrieval System.

Based on the “examinations”, series of medicines were assigned regional numbers that allowed circulation of these medicines in the Sverdlovsk region. Pharmacies and medical and preventive treatment facilities directly or directly refused to buy medicines without the “regional quality numbers” from wholesales on various excuses. As a result, wholesale suppliers incurred additional expenses, which, in their turn, led to increasing ex-works prices for drugs. Due to the “entry control”, direct looses of the six largest Russian companies involved in wholesale sales of medicines (SIA INTERNAITONAL, APTEK-HOLDING, ROSTA, Katren, PROTEK and Biotek) reached 7.8 million Rubles in 2010.

Investigating the case, the FAS Commission took into consideration the official conclusion of the Federal Service for Supervision over Health Care and Social Development (Roszdravnadzor) that the Order of the Ministry of Health Care of the Sverdlovsk Region was unlawful.

FAS decision and determination regarding the Ministry of Health Care of the Sverdlovsk Region are aimed at abolishing the anticompetitive Order.