Healthcare: The Competition Council started a new investigation on the pharma market

The Competition Council started a new investigation on the pharma market, suspecting a dominating position abuse of Boehringer Ingelheim for blocking the competitors.   According to a press release of the competition authority, it is about an investigation on the Romanian market for oral direct anti-coagulant drugs and those destined to the treatment of obstructive chronic pulmonary disease..The competition authority has hints that Boehringer Ingelheim has implemented some marketing strategies which aimed at influencing the prescription in favour of their drug, Pradaxa, in interaction with the professional in the domain of health. In this way, the development of the market and access to the patients to other drugs in the same area was limited.Similarly, the Competition Council has some evidence that Boehringer Ingelheim stopped the coming into the market of the generic drug of Spiriva, implementing a transfer strategy of the patients towards Spiolto Respimat, innovative product with the same therapeutic indications.Both Spiriva and Spiolto Respimat are drugs destined to the treatment of the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diseases in the area of the respiratory system.The innovative drug is a new drug, which is protected by patent when it is launched on the market.In this context, the Competition Council has made an unannounced inspection to the headquarters of the investigated branch of the company in Romania.The unannounced inspection was authorised by the Court of Appeal Bucharest, being justified by the necessity to obtain every piece of information and the necessary documents to clarify the possible anti-competition practice under analysis.In the situation when the Competition Council will discover the breach of competition rules, the company under analysis risks fines of up to 10% of the turnover. Even so, the company which cooperates with the competition authority, in a clemency programme, may obtain immunity to fine or a substantial reduction of the fine.The competition authority drew the attention on several occasions, after several analyses on the pharma market, to the fact that the degree of generic drugs penetration (cheaper ones) is reduced against the other states of the EU although they are at least 35% cheaper than their innovative variants.The Competition Council applied several fines to the companies in the pharma domain. Thus, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) SRL was fined with 11.9 million lei for the breach of commitments which they assumed in the investigation regarding a possible dominating position abuse.Practically, GSK was obliged to supply Avodart and Serentide on the market in Romania for a period of two years, in quantities to cover the demand of the patients, determined on the basis of the data supplied by independent sources, but the company decided to take the drugs from the list of CNAS compensated drugs.Similarly, Roche Romania SRL was sanctioned with fines worth 59.9 million lei (12.8 million euro) for dominating position abuse on the market of oncological products in Romania.