It took ten days for customs officials, the Health Oversight Agency and pharmaceutical companies to reach a compromise and resume the shipment of biological specimens. Dr. Valery Shumakov, director of the Moscow-based Institute of Transplantation is seen in the photograph.
Photo: Vasily Shaposhnikov
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Biological Specimens Transport Resumes but Falters
Russia has resumed transporting biological specimens out of the country after a two-week ban was lifted on June 9. However, ensuring the smooth shipment turned out to be more difficult than scrapping the ban as signatures on most documents from health officials are out of date.
It took ten days for customs officials, the Health Oversight Agency and pharmaceutical companies to reach a compromise and resume the shipment of biological specimens.
The Federal Customs Service put a ban on the shipments on May 28, referring to the “huge market of Russian organs and tissues”, bioterrorism scares and poorly drafted legislation. According to Russian doctors and pharmaceutical companies, the ban has hampered the treatment of 40,000 people whose specimens were being sent abroad to double-check the diagnosis, search for a marrow donor or research for new drugs.
Rules for the transport of biological specimens out of the country have not changed much. The Russian Health Oversight Agency still gives permission for biological specimens to be transported out of the country, as long as they are labeled with the protocol number of the study, the name of the research organization in Russia and the recipient of the materials, an inventory of the materials that were brought into the country, the number of specimens in the shipment, and a description of the way the specimens are packaged. Under the new rules, all these documents should bear the signatures of current chiefs of the Health Oversight Agency, which have halted the transport as most of the permissions were secured long time ago due to the length of medical research.
This point appeared to become a stumbling block, creating a jam of 3,000 permissions which are yet to be re-registered with health officials. The process takes up to a month and a half, so some pharmaceutical companies prefer to reach direct agreements with customs points. Customs authorities at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport have already given the green light to old transport permission.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of June 20, 2007
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