Bulgaria's new drug rule will "crush" market

The Association of Research-based Pharmaceutical Manufacturers (ARPharm) in Bulgaria, which represents foreign innovative drugmakers, has warned that a new ordinance requiring that all drug names should be written in the local language and in the Cyrillic alphabet will trigger "a market collapse," the Sofia Echo reports.

The pharmaceutical group has contacted Prime Minister Evgenii Zhelev to plead for a suspension of the new regulation, which currently only applies to the European Union's larger markets. Other EU member states that do not impose such language restrictions are Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Latvia and Slovakia, the ARPharm argues.