Drug procurement through international organizations will finally be made in 2015 – these are the results of the representative round table, held in the Parliament of Ukraine on July 7, 2015. It was agreed by the MPs, heads of the Ministry of Health and activists of patient organizations with the participation of international organizations (WHO, UNICEF, UNDP, Crown Agents, IDA and others.). This will reduce the cost of drugs procured at the expense of the state budget by 42% and remove the corrupt schemes which occur during the drug procurement by the state budget.

“Currently the Ministry of Health has a 4 billion 98 million UAH budget for the medicine procurement, – states Deputy Minister of Healthcare, Igor Perehinets. – The transmission of the function of drug procurement to the international organizations will allow using even these limited resources and avoiding corruption schemes during procurement. We already have prepared nomenclatures in the range of 19 programs and till the end of July are going to choose the international organizations to sign the contracts.”

Besides, the transmission of procurement to international organizations will let Ukrainian producers to receive a simplified registration procedure for entering the international market. This will be the breakthrough to world markets for many Ukrainian companies whose products meet international standards. Drugs bought through these organizations undergo a strict quality control testing.

It should be mentioned that the law of transmission of the function of drug procurement to the international organizations № 269-VIII was adopted by the Parliament in March. Nevertheless the preparatory process lasted 3 months.

“Today we are taking one more step to bring Ukraine closer to European standards in the field of healthcare – due to implementing of fateful and reformatory laws for the country, in the formation of which I had the honor to participate. Until now the Ministry of Health was actually “Ministry of Commerce”, which played with human health and life, fulfilling the corruption schemes in the field of public procurement. I hope more will not occur. And as a chairman of the parliamentary committee on health, I’m ready to provide political support to the drug procurement during 2015 and subsequent years, until the clear procurement will be established in Ukraine – carried out by international organizations. – claimed Olga Bogomolets, chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Health, during a roundtable.

During the round table international non-profit organizations have shown their readiness to purchase almost all needed drugs for Ukrainian patients in short terms. After the signing of documents by the Ministry of Health and transmission of money, the average delivery time may take from 2 weeks to 6 months. Also international organizations have shown their willingness to perform particular functions during the process of procurement, such as logistics, formation of electronic databases, distribution, and so on.

“This is a historic moment and a great victory for us because from the very beginning it was the idea of ​ public and patients. Today, having received the official statement from the Ministry of Health as well as from international organizations, we made an important step for the transmission of the function of drug procurement to international organizations and we will do everything to ensure that the process is transparent, and patients continue to take part in it and control it.” – said Dmitry Sherembey, chairman of the Foundation “Patients Ukraine.”

Under the law, Ukraine can buy medicines through the largest international non-profit organizations of the UN system, such as the World Health Organization, UNICEF, UNDP and IDA (Netherlands), Crown Agents (UK) Partnership For Supply Chain Management (USA), GDF (Switzerland).

Contact: Alexander Ustinov, 067 550 15 70, o.ustinova@antac.org.ua