How will the prescription market react?

Hundreds of thousands of confirmed patients a day earlier this year, expanding the outpatient prescription market

In 2020 and 2021, the prescription market will slow down due to strengthening hygiene such as hand washing and keeping distance

Pharmaceutical companies are also paying keen attention to the rapid increase in the number of COVID-19 confirmed cases this month.

 

Since the spread of COVID-19 in the past two years, the prescription market seems to be closely watching recent changes in the situation.

 

According to the Central Disease Control Headquarters of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on the 20th, a total of 76,402 new COVID-19 confirmed patients were counted as of 0 o'clock that day.

 

The figure was 73,582 on the 19th, the largest in 83 days since April 27 (76,765), and the figure was 70,000 for two consecutive days.

 

The "double" phenomenon, in which the number of confirmed cases doubled compared to the previous week, has continued for three weeks.

 

The pharmaceutical industry seems to be closely watching the impact of the surge in COVID-19 confirmed patients on the prescription market.

 

The domestic prescription drug market seems to have regained its previous year's upward trend this year after slowing down until last year after the spread of COVID-19.

 

According to UBIST, a pharmaceutical research institute, the total amount of outpatient prescriptions in the first half of this year was 8.2874 trillion won, up 6.1% from 7.8129 trillion won in the same period last year.

 

It increased 6.5% year-on-year to 4.1248 trillion won in the first quarter, and increased 5.7% year-on-year in the second quarter.

 

It has achieved higher growth than in 2020 and 2021.

 

The prescription amount in the first half of 2020 and 2021 grew only 2.9% and 2.6%, respectively, compared to the previous year.

 

This year means that the growth rate of the prescription drug market is more than twice as high as that of the past two years.

 

Analysts say that this year's recovery in the prescription drug market is related to a surge in the number of COVID-19 confirmed patients.

 

Earlier this year, as many as hundreds of thousands of COVID-19 confirmed patients poured out a day, prescriptions for antipyretic painkillers, cold medicines, and antibiotics used to alleviate COVID-19 symptoms increased significantly.

 

As the supply of cold medicines has not kept up with demand, the government has encouraged pharmaceutical companies to increase production and even received weekly reports of production and inventory.

 

This is quite different from the two-year slowdown in the prescription drug market in the aftermath of COVID-19 until last year after the spread of COVID-19.

 

In 2020, when COVID-19 began to spread, the amount of outpatient prescriptions was15.6365 trillion won, up 2.7% from the previous year.

 

Outpatient prescription performance last year was 16.1126 trillion won, an increase of only 3.0% from the previous year.

 

The amount of prescriptions in 2018 and 2019 increased by 8.1% and 8.2% compared to the previous year, respectively, and the growth rate fell by one-third for the second consecutive year since the spread of COVID-19.

 

It is analyzed that COVID-19 has directly contributed to the sluggish prescription drug market over the past two years.

 

After the spread of COVID-19, strengthening personal hygiene management such as hand washing and wearing masks has greatly reduced the incidence of infectious diseases, leading to a decrease in visits to medical institutions.

 

Looking at the quarterly prescription market trend until last year after the spread of COVID-19, the growth rate exceeded 5% in the third quarter of 2020 and the fourth quarter of last year alone.

 

For the rest, the growth rate of quarterly prescriptions remained between 0 and 3.2 % compared to the previous year.

 

In the second quarter of 2020, the prescription scale growth rate was only 0.7%, and as COVID-19 spread in earnest, chronic patients such as HTN and DM avoided visiting medical institutions and received long-term prescriptions, there was a gap in the prescription market.

 

In the fourth quarter of 2020, the growth rate of the prescription market was 0.0%.

 

At that time, the market for prescription drugs seems to have been reduced due to a decrease in hospital visits due to a decrease in people's external activities as the operation of entertainment bars and singing practice centers was suspended and the number of restaurants was limited.

 

Despite the same COVID-19 spread issue, the prescription market was also affected by the opposite depending on the social atmosphere.