There was no demand for online delivery of prescription drugs in Moscow and the Moscow region

An experiment in online delivery of prescription drugs, launched in Moscow, the Moscow region and the Belgorod region in March 2023, showed modest results. In less than the first year, less than 1.1 thousand orders were delivered in Moscow and the Moscow region. Some pharmacy chains talk about the complicated ordering procedure for customers, while others do not see the need for the service due to the large number of offline pharmacies.

In almost a year since the launch of the experiment on remote trading of prescription drugs in March 2023, less than 1.1 thousand orders have been issued in Moscow and the Moscow region, the Moscow Department of Health (DZM) and the Moscow Region Ministry of Health told Kommersant. In particular, about 800 orders were issued in Moscow, and 291 orders were issued in the Moscow region. In the third region participating in the experiment—the Belgorod region—Kommersant did not respond.

According to the Association of Internet Trading Companies (AKIT), since the start of the experiment in three regions, “several hundred” prescription drugs have been ordered online and delivered, says AKIT President Artem Sokolov. The Moscow Health Department adds that since September 2023 there has been an increase in the number of orders. The Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation did not promptly answer Kommersant’s questions.

Policies for delivering prescription drugs vary by region. In Moscow, you must indicate on the website or mobile application of the pharmacy chain the number of the electronic prescription, which is checked against the data of the regional medical system, after which you can select the delivery time, date and address. Upon successful order, a QR code is generated, which must be presented to the courier along with your ID. In the Moscow and Belgorod regions, an identity card is sufficient. The list of drugs approved by the Ministry of Health for online ordering includes 904 international non-proprietary names of drugs.

According to Roszdravnadzor, by mid-February, 29 permits for distance selling of medicines had been issued. According to Kommersant’s calculations, the structures of nine players received all permissions. These include Sber Eapteka, Gorzdrav (36.6 group), Zdorov.ru, structures of the Erkafarm Group of Companies (Ozerki, Doctor Stoletov), ​​Zdravcity, Tabletochka, “Dialogue”, as well as the state-owned “Capital Pharmacies” and “Mosoblmedservice”. The Moscow Region Ministry of Health says that several more networks are in the process of joining the experiment, including Vekfarm and Vita.

Since receiving permission in May 2023, Zdravcity has placed an average of about ten orders for the delivery of prescription drugs per month, says Boris Popov, general director of the marketplace. Belgorod Tabletochka has not placed a single order since July 2023, said chain owner Vadim Ranshikov. The 36.6 group and the Dialog network have a “negligible” number of orders, said 36.6 CEO Alexander Kuzin and Dialog director Tamerlan Saliev.

Vadim Ranshikov says that delivery of prescription drugs is in demand, but in the Belgorod region the ordering system is inconvenient for the buyer, including due to the need to access the prescription through government services. Boris Popov points out that a significant proportion of prescription drug buyers are elderly people who find it difficult to understand the proposed user path. Pharmacies, he adds, are limited by the lack of a unified system for verifying electronic prescriptions: integration with the region’s digital system is necessary. Tamerlan Saliev adds that in Moscow, not all couriers have an account on mos.ru, which is necessary to register in the ordering application, and delivery often costs more than the ordered drugs.

Artem Sokolov believes that the heterogeneity of requirements for the delivery of prescription drugs made the process technologically infeasible, since the requirements of the regions turned out to be incompatible with the existing and well-functioning business processes of the companies. In the delivery of over-the-counter drugs, where there was initially a single centralized approach, such problems were not observed, he points out. According to AKIT, in 2023, the number of orders for the delivery of over-the-counter drugs increased by 53.8% year-on-year, to 31.5 million.

According to DSM Group CEO Sergei Shulyak, if the system for ordering and receiving prescription drugs is simplified, the number of orders will increase, but not by much due to the generally limited demand for the service. The experiment proved that there is no need for delivery due to a sufficient number of pharmacies, says Alexander Kuzin. According to DSM Group, from January to September 2023, the number of pharmacies in Russia increased by 3.6 thousand points, to more than 74 thousand facilities.

Polina Gritsenko