Korea health ministry urges preventive regulation for clinical and dispensing platforms

The Korean Ministry of Health and Welfare reiterated that platforms used in clinical and dispensing sectors should not be evaluated by the same standards applied to general industry innovation. While IT advances have spurred active use of digital platforms in health care, the ministry stresses that preventive regulation must be established for areas directly linked to life and health. In a response to the professional journalists' council, Health and Medical Policy Officer Gwak Soon‑heon said that, considering the special nature of health care, it is necessary to pre‑emptively restrict certain profit‑making activities of platforms, referencing the recently passed amendment to the Pharmacy Act, commonly called the “DoctorNow Prevention Act.”