Almost half of the vitamins in Russia turned out to be counterfeit

After the pandemic, the whole world, including Russia, has become heavily addicted to vitamins, microelements and other supplements that are not medicines, but help improve health. However, as a study by the Higher School of Economics showed, 45% of such products sold in our country are counterfeit or falsified. In order, as experts say, to “whiten” the market, labeling of such goods for medical purposes has been introduced in Russia since October 1. Even shuttles that transport vitamins from other countries to Russia for individual orders will be included in the distribution.

A survey conducted by one popular search engine among 200 thousand Russians in 2023 showed that 81% of Russians today believe in the benefits of vitamins and microelements for health. More than half of those surveyed are willing to spend up to 3 thousand rubles a month on such goods, and only 20% will not invest a penny in them, but would rather spend the money on quality food.

In value terms, this market is showing double growth. At the same time, 53% of consumers prefer to buy such goods in pharmacies (although the law allows their sale in any retail outlets, even in markets).

In recent years, the structure of demand has changed slightly: according to the executive director of the Association of Health Products Industry, Elena Nevolina, if in 2019-2020 there was a rush demand for vitamins D, C and E (which was dictated by the pandemic), today there has been a significant bias in favor of supplements , which are designed to calm the nervous system (at the same time, the demand for antidepressants and tranquilizers has increased).

And at the same time, the chances of Russians running into low-quality and simply “left-wing” products are extremely high. An element of chaos in this market was introduced by the legalization of trade through online platforms and marketplaces. Sometimes buying even ordinary vitamins in such places can result in health problems. Everyone has heard the story of the sale of fly agaric supplements on one popular marketplace, which led to several customers being hospitalized in the intensive care unit.

“In mass markets, goods are collected manually, the requirements for the sale and transportation of such products are not met, they are literally transported in bags and suitcases, and this is a direct threat to public health,” says Emil Khubaliev, director of one of the Samara pharmacies. — I would generally prohibit some marketplaces from dealing in health products. In pharmacies, each package of vitamins is delivered to the buyer by a certified person, but here it is carried by a person on a bicycle, and it is not a fact that he is not carrying a counterfeit. Pharmacies have strict incoming product control, but marketplaces do not.”

In 2022, specialists from the Higher School of Economics conducted a market study and found that 45% (which is approximately 466 million packages) of these products in the non-pharmacy segment are counterfeit and counterfeit. Expert estimates are close: illegal trafficking of various additives in the country is at the level of 50%. These data shocked experts so much that they came up with an initiative to further regulate the market. “The abolition of health regulations for active food additives and the diversification of sales channels have led to an increase in the amount of counterfeit goods against the backdrop of an increase in consumption of these products associated with Covid,” says Lyubov Andreeva, an expert at the Center for the Development of Advanced Technologies.

From October 1, the country introduced mandatory labeling of vitamins, microelements and other active additives if these products were produced or imported after October 1. By 2025, according to experts’ plans, all legal products for this purpose will be labeled in the country (today, 200 companies in the country have received state registration certificates for such goods, and this does not count 800 importers). Thus, the market will leave the “gray” zone and “whiten up”.

And yet, some goods will not fall under control. For example, the category “complex nutritional supplements” is considered health products and is therefore not subject to labeling. In the meantime, as Andreeva says, the difference between them and supplements with a preventive effect can be very shaky: “For example, there is turmeric – and this is a seasoning, and there is curcumin – and this is a biologically active substance. There are flax seeds or meal as a food supplement, and there are as a health product. So far, additives with biological activity can only be distinguished by the presence of a state registration certificate number, although food additives are often passed off as them, violating the law on advertising.”

After the introduction of the new technical regulations of the EAEU, all probiotics and prebiotics (which until then were special food products) became biologically active additives, but, for example, hematogen did not. “If anyone doesn’t know, modern hematogen is made of sugar, and there is quite a bit of albumin in it, but no bovine blood.”

There are many complaints today about products with a low content of raw materials of animal origin. For example, this is fish oil, where manufacturers often do not add fat and gelatin. And the quality of the raw materials added to active supplements is also poorly controlled.

Experts hope to bring order to this market, but warn that consumers will have to pay extra for quality and safety (labeling costs will traditionally flow into their pockets).

Marketplaces, however, don’t really need this whole story with counterfeits. They have already begun to introduce a risk-based approach: if consumers complain about the product (for example, there is no state registration certificate), they can break off relations with the seller.

Published in the newspaper “Moskovsky Komsomolets” No. 29144 dated October 26, 2023

Newspaper headline:
Counterfeit vitamin fields