This photo is unrelated to the article. [Herald DB]
This photo is unrelated to the article. [Herald DB]

"I paid 40,000 won ($28) for the consultation, and not a single one of the 20 pharmacies near my home had the medicine." — a post from a telemedicine user

With telemedicine set to formally take effect in December under a revised Medical Act, concerns are growing that the service will be rendered half-baked as drug delivery remains categorically prohibited under the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act.

Because delivery is not permitted, patients who receive remote consultations are expected to continue facing the ordeal of trawling from pharmacy to pharmacy in search of their prescribed medications.

A telemedicine user navigates the Doctor Now application. [Provided by Doctor Now]
A telemedicine user navigates the Doctor Now application. [Provided by Doctor Now]

The contradiction of online consultations paired with offline prescription pickup is coming into sharp focus. According to industry sources Thursday, discussions on drug delivery have stalled ahead of the December rollout of telemedicine under the revised Medical Act. A relevant consultative body is expected to take up the issue, but opposition led by the Korean Pharmaceutical Association has kept talks going in circles.

The result is a structural mismatch: patients can see a doctor online but must still collect their prescriptions in person.

The ban on drug delivery means users cannot access any of the benefits the service could otherwise provide — reducing the burden on elderly patients who need repeat prescriptions, improving medical access for people with disabilities or limited mobility, cutting down on outings and waiting times for caregivers of infants and toddlers, improving access for residents of remote islands and mountain communities, and expanding scheduling flexibility for working adults.

The situation has given rise to the absurdity of patients wandering from pharmacy to pharmacy after a telemedicine consultation just to fill their prescription.

Users have voiced widespread frustration: "The consultation itself was fine, but I'm in a rural area and finding a pharmacy is a nightmare," and "I couldn't check stock anywhere, so I got the prescription but never got the medicine."

A screen from Doctor Now's pharmacy-finder page. [Doctor Now capture]
A screen from Doctor Now's pharmacy-finder page. [Doctor Now capture]

Against this backdrop, the National Assembly is set to take up the so-called Doctor Now prevention bill — an amendment to the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act — during its special session this month.

The bill would bar telemedicine platforms, which are typically IT startups, from establishing pharmaceutical wholesale operations and from steering patients toward specific pharmacies. Industry sources said the bill has cleared consultations among the ruling party, government and presidential office and is on the verge of passing a plenary vote.

Doctor Now had offered a service called Now Pharmacy, a pharmacy-finder page that displayed nearby pharmacies' medication stock in real time. Pharmacies and drug suppliers could voluntarily register their inventory in the system, helping patients who had just received a remote consultation quickly locate their prescribed medicine.

For users, it was a way to find a pharmacy without the runaround — but Doctor Now shut the service down under pressure from the National Assembly.

The company appears caught off guard by the government's abrupt policy reversal. Under the Yoon Suk Yeol administration, then-Health and Welfare Minister Cho Kyu-hong publicly stated that the Korea Fair Trade Commission had determined the Now Pharmacy service was unlikely to constitute unfair trade. As the administration changed, however, pressure from the Assembly intensified.

Concern is also mounting over the subordinate regulations the Ministry of Health and Welfare is drafting to implement the telemedicine law. The regulations appear headed toward sweeping restrictions on telemedicine. Potentially explosive provisions include a cap of 30 percent on telemedicine as a share of all clinic-level consultations, a requirement that telemedicine be conducted only within the same regional zone, and limits on remote consultations for chronic conditions such as hair loss.

"Without drug delivery, telemedicine will inevitably be reduced to a half-measure," an industry official said. "What's more, the subordinate regulations are being drafted in a way that would further erode telemedicine's practical value through blanket, positive-list-style restrictions — and that is deeply worrying."

The official added that subordinate regulations and drug delivery policy should be designed to allow more patients to benefit from medical care.


ko@heraldcorp.com