Government determined how to reimburse the cost of medicines issued for paper prescriptions before March 31, 2019

On July 16th, Decision of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine dated June 26, 2019 No. 577 entered into force. By this act, the Government had amended the paragraph 2 of the Decision of the Cabinet of Ministers dated February 27, 2019 No. 135 “Some Issues of Reimbursement of Medicines”.

According to the Decision, budget managers would be able to reimburse the cost of medicines, which take part in the program “Affordable Medicines” and were sold to the population based on paper prescriptions. It should be noted that with the transition of administration of the reimbursement program to the National Health Service of Ukraine, starting from April 1, 2019 medicines will be reimbursed exclusively based on electronic prescriptions.

Costs of medicines released based on paper prescriptions will be reimbursed at the expense of remaining subvention from the state budget to local budgets. For this, pharmacies must submit reports on medicines dispensed before March 31, 2019 (inclusive) to budget managers. The form of the relevant report is approved by the Decision of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine No. 577.

Moreover, local councils were granted discretions, if necessary, in addition to the volumes of the above subvention, make decisions on reimbursement of medicines issued by business entities before March 31, 2019 (inclusive) from local budgets.

Thus, the adoption of the Decision of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine No. 577 solves the issue of payment to pharmacies of arrears arising from the sale of medicines before April 1, 2019.