The commercial drugs market grew by 11% in volume, driven mainly by the increase in domestic production of generic and cheaper drugs. The market grew by 51% in Russian Rouble terms but suffered a drop of 17% in USD value terms due to the heavy currency depreciation between 2014-2018. The volume growth can be attributed to an increased focus on domestic production under the aegis of state-run sectoral development programs like “Pharma 2020”. However, the growth in value results from the substantial growth in the sale of generics preferred as substitutes to prescribed medicines because of lower personal incomes. State drug supply programs are also said to promote a switch to generics due to budgetary reasons. Hospital procurement and state-subsidized drug purchases focusing largely on promoting local medicines were estimated to contribute to around 32% of the market size as of 2017. As a result, the share of generics was estimated to contribute 83.2% to the total market size in volume and 61.6% in value as of 2018.