On Monday, 9 March, the ruble dropped dramatically amid Russia’s reject to extend the agreement with OPEC, which implies additional cut in oil production. This happened against the background of the coronavirus epidemic and consequent shutdown of a great number of industries as well as abnormally warm winter.
After the coronavirus pandemic declaration the dollar continued to increase.
On Wednesday First Deputy Prime Minister Andrey Belousov stated, there was a risk that home appliances and medicine prices would rise, RIA Novosti news agency reported. However, he explained that the government would take measures to prevent that and said there was no fatal danger yet. The official pointed out that medicines “included in vital and essential drugs list should not go up in price under any circumstances, of course”.
Pharmacological expert Nikolay Bespalov mentioned in the conversation with AIDS.CENTER that rise in price on drugs from vital and essential drugs list should not be expected. According to him, medicines not included in that list might increase in price. Because of the coronavirus situation a number of production facilities have shut down. It is hard to predict now how it will affect the situation with drug procurement, he says. ‘The events on the currency market are speculative to a certain extent. Probably, in a week or two exchange rate will become stable. It is clear that there will be no auctions for a certain number of drugs but it is not likely to be large-scale’, Bespalov pointed out.
Alexey Mikhailov, Monitoring Division Manager at the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition, says no shortage of antiretroviral drugs due to the fall of the ruble should be expected. According to him, the highest possible prices are already registered in the country and “upward price revision is a complicated and slow process”. Anyway he doesn’t deny that the situation with the ruble might affect medicines produced abroad or not fully made in the Russian Federation. But it is by no means certain, “as we don’t know their agreement terms”.
‘Last time, when we had a similar situation in 2014, we observed no significant rise in prices in rubles, while prices in dollars fell. That’s why I don’t think there will be any price hikes,’ he said.
Sergey Yeskin, pharmaceutical distributor “Puls” Development Director, also believes that drugs and medical products prices won’t rise significantly. Vedomosti newspaper reports, citing the expert, that in the last couple of years pharmaceutical market has become much less sensitive to ruble exchange rate fluctuations. According to him, it is more likely that changes will be caused not by exchange rate difference but by the situation with COVID-19 in China, which is one of the main substances supplier.