Wholesale, pharmacy mark-up, and retail price dynamics under a declaration-based medicine pricing reform in Kosovo.

BACKGROUND

Medicines' price control is commonly employed to enhance price transparency and affordability; however, empirical evidence on its effects following first-time implementation in European markets with developing pharmaceutical regulatory frameworks remains limited.

RESEARCH DESIGN AND

METHODS

This repeated cross-sectional analysis of administrative databases evaluated the official Kosovo medicine price list, consisting of 19 published price-list versions (V1.0, Feb 2025 to V1.18, 25 June 2026), focusing on version-specific changes in final wholesale and retail prices.

RESULTS

A total of 69,683 medicine-version records and 5,720 unique products were identified. Among 1,937 medicines included in both V1.0 and V1.18, the wholesale price rose in 1,088 cases (56.17%), fell in 501 (25.86%) cases, and remained unchanged in 348 (17.97%). The retail price increased in 1,205 cases (62.21%), declined in 697 (35.98%), and remained stable in 35 cases (1.81%). The concordance between retail and wholesale price direction was observed in 1,535 cases (79.25%).

CONCLUSIONS

The price-leveling worked more like a recalibration of the regulatory system based on declarations than a consistent reduction of prices, involving concurrent adjustments, removals, and additions in the price list as well as some retail-level discordances driven by the regulated pharmacy mark-up and value-added tax (VAT) rules.