Turkey's 'too cheap drugs' smuggled to neighboring countries

People have been purchasing medicine from Turkish pharmacies, where medicine prices are quite low, and then selling them in neighboring markets with higher margins, according to sector representatives.  

?They take the products from Turkey and sell it in Iran or Kazakhstan or other neighboring countries for instance for three to four times higher prices. As the sector representatives, we lose profit. The product is also stolen from Turkish consumers, as the access to many medicines may become limited from time to time,? Roche Turkey General Manager Adriano Treve said in an interview with Hürriyet Daily News. 

Such cases were reported earlier in the country. For instance, a vitamin supplement which is important for bone health could not be found in pharmacies last autumn. While the manufacturing company was claimed to have not sold enough of the product to meet demand, the company said there was no problem with the supply. Besides, such problems were seen in regard to drugs for much more serious diseases, such as cancer. 

Treve said another serious problem in the sector is that it takes too long to bring a brand new product into the Turkish market due to the overburden of regulations, and sector players should be able to take up such issues with government representatives. 

Turkey?s price positioning matters for many pharmaceutical companies as the country has been seen as a reference country for Middle Eastern countries. The cheaper the prices become in Turkey?s drug sector, the higher the discounts Middle Eastern countries ask for, according to sector reports. Turkey uses a reference pricing system in the industry. This pricing system formulates the price on the basis of the lowest price offered to the warehouse in Turkey by a...