Romanian pharmaceutical market grew by over 15% in H1 2010

2010-08-19

In the first six months of the year the value of the Romanian pharmaceutical market grew to RON 4.88bn in wholesale prices, which is 15.4% more in comparison with H1 2009, according to IMS Health data. In euro terms, the market grew by 17.6% y-o-y to €1.17bn.
The growth was driven mainly by the pharmacy retail segment which expanded by 18.4% to RON 4bn (€942.9m), whilst hospital sales declined by 5% to RON 519m (€122.3m). In terms of volume, the retail segment increased by 2% to 223.2 million units and hospital sales decreased by 12.5% to 17.1 million units. In H1 2010 the overall market volume grew by 0.8% only to 240.3 million units sold. Volume sales of Rx medicines increased in H1 2010 by 2.5% to 175.3 million units and OTC drug sales declined by 3.7% to 65 million units.
Growth of the Romanian pharmaceutical market was impacted by drug price increases implemented in April 2010 and by the re-orientation of drug manufacturers’ marketing efforts to promote the medicines with higher prices. The consumers were also trying to use more expensive but reimbursed drugs.