The online segment includes a wide variety of platforms, many of which sell beauty and health products. These are marketplaces such as www.iHerb.com and others, electronics and household appliances stores, as well as official online stores of companies, for example www.shop.philips.ru. Despite the product range overlapping with that of pharmacies, many of the online retailers still operate outside the pharmaceutical market as such and do not enter into direct competition with the pharmaceutical retail, while often influencing consumption trends, given the scale of certain players.

48% of doctors say that COVID-19 test results are, on average, ready within 1-2 days, according to a survey by the RNC Pharma analyst company and the Doktor Na Rabote (Doctor at Work) social media service for doctors. Some even say the tests can be ready as soon as in “less than 6 hours”, which is a very promising result for mass testing. The survey did not find out any statistically significant differences between Moscow / St. Petersburg and other regions of Russia, although the situation in general is much better in the capital regions, with around 58% of the respondents choosing “maximum 1-2 days.”

19% of pharmacists read the digital version of the newspaper Farmatsevtichesky Vestnik, 17% – Katren-Style, and around 12% choose Novaya Apteka, according to an online survey by the RNC Pharma analyst company and the Doktor Na Rabote (Doctor at Work) social media service for doctors. It is noteworthy that many respondents read several publications at the same time, and the order of priority is set in approximately the same way. The top three publications include two print media, with only Katren-Style now fully digital.

Only 4% of pharmacists are “definitely” not ready to read digital editions and prefer print media, according to an online survey by the RNC Pharma analyst company and the Doktor Na Rabote (Doctor at Work) social media service for doctors. Another 23% of the respondents are more likely to pick the latter over the former, but are not dead set against electronic media. Speaking about the advantages of print media, the respondents most often noted the possibility to bookmark and make notes, as well as their independence from the Internet.