Egypt increases prices of 3,000 traded drugs
Egypt’s Ministry of Health has increased the prices of 3,000 drugs out of 12,000 varieties on market, Egypt Independent reported on Wednesday.
The Minister of Health and Population Ahmed Emad El-Din said in a statement on Wednesday that the increase would be 15 per cent for locally produced drugs and 20 per cent for imported drugs. He added that the prices of chronic disease drugs have also been increased by up to 10 per cent.
Emad El-Din pointed out that the increase was approved after several meetings with state regulatory agencies, and local and international pharmaceutical companies. The Health Ministry reached a compromise with the companies over the acceptable level of increase, in order to maintain the interests of Egyptian patients, according to the minister’s statement.
He promised that the ministry will hold a press conference on Thursday to announce the list of the local and foreign drugs whose prices were increased, stressing that the hikes will not apply to the stock of drugs already produced before the decision, which will be sold in accordance to the old prices.
The Egyptian minister pointed out that the pharmaceutical companies had earlier suggested increasing the prices of all medications following the increase of the Egyptian pound exchange rate, due to the high cost of raw materials for which prices had doubled. The proposal was later rejected by the ministry.
Emad El-Din added that pharmaceutical companies also suggested increasing 30 per cent of each company’s products by 50 per cent every three months, but the Health Ministry, the cabinet, and the parliament had refused the proposal, according to Daily News Egypt.
He reiterated that the government did not bow to pharmaceutical companies, and based negotiations and solutions on serving the Egyptian patient’s health.
The minister explained that the government had to agree to the companies’ demand to increase prices otherwise drug production in Egypt would stop. “Everyone knows that pharmaceutical companies went through severe financial pressures as a result of the liberalisation of the US dollar exchange rate and we respect that. They had to increase prices to avoid the disappearance of medication from the market and the hampering of the industry”, he said.
According to the ministry, price increases saved the Egyptian patient from suffering medicines’ shortage; therefore, prices were increased appropriately by the government. However, the increase doesn’t commensurate with the increase of the US dollar exchange price in any way, according to him.
The recent floatation of the Egyptian pound, which was decided by the Central Bank last November, led to a rise in the prices of imported raw materials used by pharmaceutical companies in the production of drugs, consequently leading companies to demand doubling the prices of medicines on the market to cover the increase in the raw material prices.
Source: Middle East Monitor
