The Ukraine government has hyped up the threat of swine flu, causing panic-driven demand for medicines, claims an intriguing blog post on UkraineWatch.
According to the piece, the government subsequently:
- Caused stock-outs through scaremongering, as demand skyrocketed
- Imposed price controls
- Threatened to arrest anyone "profiteering" from the swine flu panic
As a result of the latter two policies, supply of medicines plummeted. So having boosted demand, they then quashed supply.
Smart, eh?
The article says this caused people to turn to traditional remedies (boosting their prices, too), yet an equally likely side-effect would be an increase in fake medicines.
And this month we've already had news of high levels of fakes in Ukraine - such as in this excellent report on SecuringPharma.
Reliable figures, they state, are not readily available to reveal how many fakes operate in the Ukraine market. But with neighbouring Russia's leading industry in fake Tamiflu, I bet there's a steady supply plaguing the market.
If this is the case, hopefully people will remember the policymakers who kicked it off in the first place.
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