‘Last year, Roszdravnadzor (the state healthcare watchdog) examined 807 healthcare and pharmaceutical entities based in Sverdlovsk Region, which resulted in 43 warnings and 13 reports placed with courts. 249 medical establishments and 184 pharmaceutical companies were provided with licenses (compared to 232 and 102 in 2005, respectively), yet the number of licenses to entities involved in handling drugs and psychotropic agents went down from 32 to 24, which is a little suspicious,’ says Galina Burdina of Sverdlovsk Region division of Roszdravnadzor.

‘Among the main offenses were lack of documents that could prove a company’s right to use a certain building, imperfect quality control management, incompliance with the regulations related to safekeeping of pharmaceuticals. Private medical establishments would often provide the licensing authorities with falsified personnel data,’ she observed.