Legal regulation of drug advertising and its restrictions in the conditions of the Slovak Republic

Abstract The question of drug availability is a key requirement for each country. Their deficiency can cause fatal consequences for the health of the population. For this reason, the production and distribution of medicines represents the economic potential of the state, which is also protected and regulated in the Slovak Republic. Drug distribution is also part of every market economy as it is the primary form of business-to-customer (B2C) offering. At first glance, the promotion of drugs might seem to be just marketing. But this area is under the scrutiny of the Slovak legislations. From the point of view of the systemic nature of law, advertising of medicinal products is regulated both in public law and private law. This is particularly the area of administrative law, commercial law and civil or criminal law, which must respect the often complicated penetration of European law into national law. The issue of ad management and the associated availability of medicines, in our terms, is at the centre of public interest. The main aim of the authors in this paper is to examine not only the European but especially the national legal regulation of the advertising of medicines in the context of the decision-making activity of the Slovak authorities supervising compliance with the legal restrictions on the promotion of pharmaceutical products. Another goal is to identify the problems in application practice and to propose ways to eliminate identified shortcomings by specific procedures. The authors, through scientific and doctrinal interpretation, examine selected statutes of the Law on Advertising and related legislation pertaining to the issue of drug advertising. Through expert literature, jurisprudence and the decision-making processes of the administrative authorities, they seek answers to practical application problems. At the end of the contribution, they critically analyse the identified shortcomings and propose appropriate measures to eliminate them.