ROME
The game on the liberalization of medicines could be topical again very soon. Antitrust president Antonio Catricalà rekindles the issue after the jabs made in the past: "The annual law on competition - he explains to Il Sole 24 Ore on the sidelines of a conference organized by the National Coordination of Parapharmacies - could be the ideal vehicle to extend the deregulation also to class C drugs", those with a prescription but paid by citizens. An old dot of the market guarantor, who in 2006 played side by side with the former Minister of Economic Development Pier Luigi Bersani to open the doors of parapharmacies to the sale of over-the-counter medicines.
«A principle of equal professional dignity is at stake - Catricalà insists - with the same qualifications and qualifications, maintaining a distinction between pharmacies and parapharmacies seems to me frankly unconstitutional. Unfortunately, with the lobby system, even the obvious becomes an impossible goal and liberalizing is more difficult in times of crisis. But in the long run - adds the guarantor - the battle will be successful.
One thinks precisely of the fears triggered by the Bersani law of 2006 and the results then produced in the field, which according to the president of the Antitrust can be seen in new jobs created and discounts for consumers in the face of "reduced disadvantages for traditional pharmacies which have lost a lower than expected market share". However, Catricalà knows that the path is not downhill. A further opening in the distribution of medicines has been discussed for some time but an adequate consensus has never been cemented. Even during the conference that took place yesterday in Rome, the first of the parapharmacies in single coordination, there was no lack of opposing opinions: absent Federfarma, it was the federation of pharmacist orders that expressed strong perplexities about a new deregulation. Moreover, even on the over-the-counter drug reform itself, an attempt has recently been made to downsize through parliamentary means.
However, the guarantor seems oriented not to miss the next train. The main points of the annual law on competition, more than nine months late compared to what was established by the development law of 2009, should flow into the Calderoli decree on simplifications scheduled for May. "I really hope that the law won't kill me," says Catricalà, underlining some of the main requests addressed to the government: reform of the fuel network, establishment of an Authority for transport, and precisely medicines. On this last point, the current version of the law is very cautious and only establishes a provision on the obligation to advertise prices for over-the-counter or self-medication drugs. But in the parliamentary path, says Catricalà, glimmers could open up "with an amendment", which is already being studied and on whose contents Mister Prices' attention has also rested.
On closer inspection, there is enough to officially reopen the debate, complete with predictable controversies.
March 30, 2011 –
