{"id":15482,"date":"2026-05-05T10:56:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T10:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/05\/high-cost-drug-access-expands-to-private-hands\/"},"modified":"2026-05-05T10:56:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T10:56:07","slug":"high-cost-drug-access-expands-to-private-hands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/05\/high-cost-drug-access-expands-to-private-hands\/","title":{"rendered":"High-cost drug access expands to private hands"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"post-1302787\">\n    <!-- .entry-header --><\/p>\n<div class=\"first-img article_thumbnail_wrapper\" itemscope=\"\" itemprop=\"associatedMedia\" itemtype=\"http:\/\/schema.org\/ImageObject\">\n                                                                    <picture><source media=\"(max-width: 767px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/pharmacy-thumb-large-320x200.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"600\" class=\"picture-main-block-image\" data-nxsrc=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/pharmacy-thumb-large.jpg\" alt=\"High-cost drug access expands to private hands\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/pharmacy-thumb-large.jpg\"\/><br \/>\n                        <\/source><\/picture>\n                                                        <\/div>\n<div class=\"entry-content\" itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p>Greece is expanding access to high-cost medications by allowing private pharmacies to dispense drugs previously available only through state insurer EOPPY outlets, where patient wait times routinely exceed 90 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>The Health Ministry aims to shift roughly 67,000 of EOPPY\u2019s 180,000 monthly prescriptions to private pharmacies. Currently participating pharmacies can dispense treatments for multiple sclerosis, oncology, and biological agents for tumors, with hepatitis B and asthma medications being added in early June.<\/p>\n<p>The program\u2019s launch in February was rocky \u2013 only 1,330 medications were dispensed across approximately 8,000 participating pharmacies in the first month. Officials have since relaunched the initiative alongside a public awareness campaign.<\/p>\n<p>The Panhellenic Pharmaceutical Association has raised safety concerns about home delivery and distribution through 64 decentralized municipal points, warning of cold-chain risks and insufficient pharmacist oversight. President Apostolos Valtas said the association would pursue legal action.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><!-- .entry-content --><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script>\n        var NXFBPixelFunc = function () {\n            document.removeEventListener(\"scroll\", NXFBPixelFunc);\n            setTimeout(function () {\n                !function (f, b, e, v, n, t, s) {\n                    if (f.fbq) return;\n                    n = f.fbq = function () {\n                        n.callMethod ?\n                            n.callMethod.apply(n, arguments) : n.queue.push(arguments)\n                    };\n                    if (!f._fbq) f._fbq = n;\n                    n.push = n;\n                    n.loaded = !0;\n                    n.version = '2.0';\n                    n.queue = [];\n                    t = b.createElement(e);\n                    t.async = !0;\n                    t.src = v;\n                    s = b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\n                    s.parentNode.insertBefore(t, s)\n                }(window, document, 'script',\n                    'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n                fbq('init', '109138906120213');\n                fbq('track', 'PageView');\n            }, 0)\n        };\n        document.addEventListener(\"scroll\", NXFBPixelFunc);\n    <\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/in-depth\/society-in-depth\/1302787\/high-cost-drug-access-expands-to-private-hands\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Greece is expanding access to high-cost medications by allowing private pharmacies to dispense drugs previously available only through state insurer EOPPY outlets, where patient wait times routinely exceed 90 minutes. The Health Ministry aims to shift roughly 67,000 of EOPPY\u2019s 180,000 monthly prescriptions to private pharmacies. Currently participating pharmacies can dispense treatments for multiple sclerosis, &#8230; <\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more-container\"><a title=\"High-cost drug access expands to private hands\" class=\"read-more button\" href=\"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/05\/high-cost-drug-access-expands-to-private-hands\/#more-15482\" aria-label=\"Read more about High-cost drug access expands to private hands\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15483,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/pharmacy-thumb-large.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","no-featured-image-padding"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15482\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}