Today, on March 24, the Armenian Lawyers’ Association and the Initiative Group (including the Armenian Association of Young Doctors, the Medicine Producers and Importers Union of Armenia and a number of other organizations) held a meeting-discussion related to the drugs provide by prescription.
Mr. Gevorg Grigoryan, President of the Armenian Association of Young Doctors, member of the Governing Board of Armenian CSOs Anti-Corruption Coalition stated that there is a need to introduce an institute of drug prescription so that patients shall not have inconveniences, and doctors shall not have to extra expenses and avoid duplication. “The decision on prescription was originally issued to the paper with a delay of 6 days. We started working in compliance with it from March 1, on March 6, the Government decided that it should be done according to the schedule. In response to the question who is responsible for the fact of 6 days illegal activities carried out by the drugstores, nobody answered. This is an insufficient level of awareness actibvities because we, doctors and patients, have never been informed about how it should be done.” According to Gevorg Grigoryan, the international experience should also be taken into consideration.
Advocate Mariam Zadoyan, expert of the Armenian Lawyers’ Association, said that she should submit an unsuccessful international experience as such procedures lead to failure. “Our legislation does not specify a legal regulation of any country that will prove to be successful. Usually, the justification of the drafts points out the successful attempts, which we take and apply in Armenia. But such experience is not mentioned here,” Mariam Zadoyan said.
She presented the experience of prescribing drugs in neighboring Georgia, as well as Moldova, Spain, Estonia, and the United States.
“I suggest health care organizations to unite and send a letter of protest to the President, the Prime Minister and other government officials that such experimental work with the nation, the private sector, the healthcare sector, is not acceptable and it is enough,” Samvel Zakaryan, President of the Medicine Producers and Importers Union of Armenia said in his speech at the discussion.
In his words, nobody question the fact that prescriptions for drugs are needed, but these strict measures should be implemented correctly and should be considered by the private sector. Samvel Zakaryan also raised the issue that these procedures may cause corruption risks in pharmacy network. He noted that in some pharmacies the pharmacists imagined themselves to be doctors. “They say, send the patient to our pharmacy, we’ll give the prescription. Corruption enters pharmacies.
Notably, at the March 6 sitting, the Government decided to set a clear schedule for drug prescription.
1. Drugs with antibiotics (antibacterial drugs, antifungal agents, hormonal medicine, antiviral drugs, immune systemic and immunoglobulin, vaccines) will be provide by prescriptions from 1 March, 2018,
2. Drugs for injection starting from 1 July, 2018,
3. All medicines, which are registered in the Republic of Armenia as prescription drugs, will be provided with prescription starting 1 October, 2018.
Details in the videos.
Alisa Chilingaryan:
