PRODUCTION INSTEAD OF IMPORT

The issue of replacing imported goods with their domestic counterparts is particularly acute for Russia today: the large-scale sanctions imposed against the Russian Federation recently have gone “live”. At the same time, there are enterprises in the Urals that have been working for a long time under the import substitution program and, perhaps, have prepared better than others for the events that have come: about one of these productions — in the “Federalpress” material.

What does the import substitution pro-cess look like in practice? We found the answer to this question at the pharmaceutical complex “Medsintez”, located in the city of Novouralsk, Sverdlovsk region. The plant has been operating since 2003 and all this time has been actively involved in the implementation of state import substitution programs, ensuring the needs of Russian patients in high-quality and inexpensive medicines. Today, Medsintez is a full-c ycle enterprise: all processes from ideas to the release of finished products take place within the same walls, thanks to which medicines in sufficient quantity and on time “get” to hospitals and pharmacies.

Uninterrupted supply of medicines is especially important for people with diabetes, of whom there were more than 5 million people in our country in 2020. For them, since 2008, Medsintez has been implementing a vital project for the import substitution of insulin: a modern research laboratory was created on the basis of the enterprise and the production of genetically engineered and analog drugs Rosinsulin and Rosinsulin Aspart R from its own substance was launched, which allowed to reduce the prices of imported insulin analogues and “fill” the domestic the market of Russian products. Next in line is a new version of the drug “Rosinsulin Glargine”, which is awaiting certification from the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation in the near future.

Another promising direction of Medsintez is the production of hormonal drugs for IVF, and in Russia it is still the only plant producing such products. In 2018, the company’s specialists, in cooperation with the AiViFarma company, developed and launched the release of Primapur, a means for the treatment of infertility, which helps Russian women to find maternal happiness. The plant produces Primapur entirely from domestic components and is supplied in the form of disposable syringe pens with a total number of up to one million copies per year — today this more than doubles the needs of the market.

The pandemic was fully met at the enterprise: back in 2014, Medsintez patented a unique antiviral drug Triazavirin for the treatment of viral diseases, which later became an effective means to combat the “crown”. The results of its use exceeded the expectations of the developers: as a result, Triazavirin was included in the regulations for the treatment of COVID-19 for employees of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation and recommended for mass use by the Department of Health of the city of Moscow. Soon, attention was drawn to the Russian experience in China — Harbin University was given the “green light” for the use of the drug in China and an international group of specialists was formed for in-depth cooperation in this area. “Triazavirin” is included in the Federal Clinical Recommendations of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation for the treatment of influenza and ARVI, and today it is dispensed in pharmacies without a prescription: the corresponding decision was made by the Ministry of Health in 2021.

Foreign sanctions have also affected the work of scientific laboratories in Russia: most of them lost supplies of reagents from Europe overnight. However, the potential of Medsintez allows it to start producing almost any import-substituting drugs as they are in demand on the Russian market. In addition, it is possible to organize contract production at the plant, which includes the use of scientific and production facilities of Medsintez for the production of third-party products under the customer’s own brand.

As it turned out, timely investment of efforts and funds in the scientific base and the creation of a technologically closed production cycle can not only bring economic benefits, but also create a technological reserve for the future. In the new conditions, this can become a weighty argument for rejecting imported goods and services.

Author Alexey Zotov

Source «FederalPress» magazine