A retail pharmacy’s sales reached almost RON3 million in 2014, compared with RON1.5 million in 2008.
Although sales doubled in the past few years, the number of retail pharmacies remained about the same as in the boom period, no more than 5,600.
“Consumption of pharmaceutical drugs has not risen in the past few years, only the price did. Which means cheap drugs disappeared from the market replaced by more expensive versions, hence the higher value of the market,” explains Dragos Damian, chief executive officer of pharmaceutical company Terapia Cluj and chairman of the Generic Drug Manufacturers Association in Romania (APMGR).
The sales boom pharmacies saw in 2009-2010 (when their sales rose by RON2 billion a year) was because of the rise in the monthly subsidized drug cap and introduction of about 300 new drugs on the list, which induced a false rise in sales, he added.
Following changes in the pharmaceutical industry among which the clawback tax, pharmaceutical retail was flat at RON12.4 billion in 2011 and then only increased by no more than RON1 billion a year.
The leader of the more than RON15 billion pharmaceutical retail market is Catena, part of the Fildas group established by entrepreneur Anca Vlad, with more than 550 pharmacies.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)