Source: Mundo Legal, 13/07/2007

The judge of the 5th Municipal Public Finance Court, Agostinho Gomes de Azevedo, denied an injunction, thus preventing a partnership between handling pharmacies and drugstores, since he did not consider “a priori” that the prohibition on collaboration threatens the company's rights.

A manipulation pharmacy entered the court with an injunction request against the Municipality of Belo Horizonte, requesting the right to partner with drugstores.

To justify their request, the handling pharmacy argued that drugstores work with the sale of industrialized medicines, whereas handling pharmacies are artisanal, and aim to fill the existing gap due to the industry's lack of interest in producing certain medications or certain dosages, being benefit to the consumer.

The pharmacy intends to maintain the partnership to commercialize the manipulated formulas, because there is no way to open several points of sale. She cites the enormous demands related to the necessary laboratory resources, quality control, quantity, variety and the expiry date, often scarce, of certain raw materials.

The head of health surveillance in the city of Belo Horizonte did not authorize the activity of intermediating receipts for handling, based on a resolution by the National Health Surveillance Agency. The resolution prohibits the capture of recipes containing official prescriptions in drugstores, even though branches of the same company, as well as intermediation between companies.

The judge did not respond to the request for the preliminary injunction, as he considered “it is a matter subject to interpretation, but the verification of other elements”.