Inventory of condition of sale of drugs online in Europe
Online sale of health products is very different accross European countries. France is far from its neighbors by only proposing online sale for medicines without prescription, such as Belgium, Spain and Italy. Germany and the United Kingdom adopted the idea of selling online drugs a long time ago. The Netherlands and The United Kingdom even authorize online sale for all drugs without requiring pharmacies to be backed to a physical pharmacy. Switzerland also authorizes online sale but only for drugs with prescription.
As a result, France achieves only 1% of online sales (against 8% in Germany and England). This is mainly due to a lack of suitable offers and knowledge of these offers.
The economic consequences are important because this market is only € 20 million products sold per year in France against € 1.9 billion in Germany.
In addition, French consumers look forward foreign web sites including Belgium at the expense of pharmacies and local actors.
