Daily Times

LAHORE: Members of the Pakistan Young Pharmacist Association and the Pakistan Drug Lawyers Forum staged a protest against medicine price hike in front of Lahore Press Club (LPC) on Friday.

They also appealed to the chief justice of Pakistan to take suo motu notice of the medicines’ price hike and reduce prices of medicines by five to 10 times under section 7(8) of Drugs Act, 1976.

Speaking on the occasion, Pakistan Drug Lawyers Forum President Dr Noor Muhammad Mahar said that the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan was illegally, unlawfully and issuing registration certificates of medicines with brand names, whereas under the Section 7(8) of the Drugs Act 1976, single ingredient medicines must be given generic names. “The legislature has inserted this section to eradicate monopoly of larger companies over the smaller companies and reduce the medicine prices, but DRAP officials are issuing registration certificates with brand names after getting huge bribe,” he said.

He added that the DRAP had registered stents without fixing price, which was a clear violation of Section 12 of the Drugs Act, 1976. “The DRAP with the connivance of health officials are importing stents at the rate of Rs 5,000 per piece which is being sold for Rs 25,000 per piece. He said that DRAP CEO Aslam Afghani had registered substandard stents. “Aslam Afghani has also registered stents from a company owned by a federal minister. There is no laboratory to check the quality of stents, medical devices, diagnostics and implants,” he said

He went on to say: “Naxavir tablets, which is used to cure cancer patients is being sold for Rs 24,0000 per pack, whereas it is being sold for Rs 8,000 per pack in India. Profit making pharmaceutical companies in connivance with doctors, DRAP and health officials are looting the patients, who may die without medicine or stents.”

Pakistan Young Pharmacist Association Joint Secretary Dr Hina Shaukat said that this was misuse and abuse of official powers. She gave example that hepatitis medicine sofosbuvir was purchased by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government at Rs 48 per tablet and DRAP granted a registration letter with brand name at Rs 55,000 for 28 tablets. “It means there is 4,075 percent price difference.”

Young Pharmacist Association General Secretary Dr Haroon Yousaf said that the DRAP must re-issue all registration letters of 70,000 medicines with generic names. “In a number of medicines there is almost 1,000 percent price difference in different brands with same generic medicines. We are raising our voice and appeal to the prime minister and the Punjab chief minister to check the price hike and looting by Club of 50 and the DRAP,” he added.

He also criticised the Punjab government’s campaign against spurious medicines, saying “it is a fake campaign, as government is not addressing the root cause of the problem”.