On the morning of 4 October, Russian troops destroyed the production site of the pharmaceutical company KUSUM in Sumy. Yevhen Miroshnychenko, a 52-year-old employee of the engineering department, was killed during the attack. According to the Sumy Regional State Administration, the facility was struck by three attack drones, after which a major fire broke out. The company has stated that it will continue to operate and will endeavour to maintain the supply of medicines to Ukraine.
Briefly about the main points
- Three attack drones struck a pharmaceutical plant in Sumy.
- Yevhen Miroshnychenko, an employee of the engineering department who had been working at the factory since 2009, has died.
- KUSUM confirmed that it was the production site that had been destroyed.
- The group plans to use Indian production capacity to supply Ukraine.
- The company is assessing the extent of the damage and reorganising its production and logistics operations.
Fire following an impact and the death of a company engineer
Sumy Regional State Administration reported that Russian troops had launched three attacks on the factory strike UAVs. The strikes caused a major fire, and the building suffered extensive damage.
The deceased Yevhen Miroshnychenko He had been working in the engineering department of the Sumy plant since 2009. KUSUM described his death as an irreparable loss for the team and expressed their condolences to his family and loved ones.
On the day of the attack, the President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reported that a medical supplies depot in Sumy had been hit. The company later clarified that the strike had destroyed its production site, where medicines for the Ukrainian market were manufactured.
According to the State Service of Ukraine on Medicines and Medical Devices, the GMP documentation for the Sumy site covered the manufacture of non-sterile medicinal products in the form of tablets, hard capsules, granules, oral liquids, suspensions and syrups, as well as packaging and laboratory testing.
The company is developing alternative production and logistics solutions
KUSUM has stated that it is assessing the full extent of the damage but is not suspending operations. The company has identified the safety of its staff, support for its workforce and ensuring patients have access to the necessary medicines as its priorities.
The group has production facilities in India, specifically in Indore and Bhiwadi. The company plans to reorganise its production processes and logistics to ensure an uninterrupted supply of medicines to Ukraine, provided that regulatory restrictions do not prevent this.
In March, the Cabinet of Ministers introduced a procedure for transferring the production of registered medicines from facilities that have been destroyed or rendered unusable as a result of the war to other licensed sites — subject to the approval of the Ministry of Health. This mechanism could potentially be applied in similar situations; however, decisions regarding a specific manufacturer are taken in accordance with the established procedure.
The existence of overseas production sites may reduce the risk of a sudden halt to supplies of the group’s entire product range. At the same time, the resumption of production of individual items will depend on manufacturing, logistical and regulatory procedures.
The strike on the factory was part of a series of attacks on the Sumy region
The attack on KUSUM took place as part of a wider series of Russian strikes on Sumy and the surrounding region. Over the past 24 hours, the regional military administration recorded 45 shelling incidents across 14 communities.
In the Sumy community, due to drone strikes and guided aerial bombs One man was killed and dozens of people were injured. Some of the KAB strikes damaged residential buildings, cars and other civilian targets.
As of 5 October, KUSUM is continuing to assess the damage to its Sumy plant and has announced that it is reorganising its production and logistics processes to minimise the risk of disruptions to the Ukrainian market.
