Different countries have different health systems and doctors face different constraints. This was in Israel in the early 2000s. In this case it was done just

Different countries have different health systems and doctors face different constraints. This was in Israel in the early 2000s. In this case it was done just to save the doctor the hassle of arguing with the higher ups. It's been a while, but if I recall correctly, Merck was aggressively enforcing its patent rights. It was even raiding compounding pharmacies that sold lower dose formulations of finasteride instead of the brand name Propecia. https://news.walla.co.il/item/932056 https://news.walla.co.il/item/932056 (Google Translate does an almost reasonable job)