Staff Reporter :
Prices of 53 essential medicines including painkillers, antibiotics, anti-infectives will go up from this month, with the government allowing an increase for the scheduled drugs up to 100 per cent.
The 58th meeting of the drug pricing committee held in the conference of the Ministry of Health on June 30 approved the revised prices of these drugs, officials of the Directorate General of Drug Administration (DGDA) said.
However, the DGDA has not published any notification in this regard till date.
Last time in 2015, the prices of some brands of medicines were increased.
But the DGDA came up with the move after almost seven years amid growing pressure of the drug manufacturers.
“The government has decided to increase the prices of 53 brands of 20 generic drugs that are widely used in primary health care,” a DGDA official told The New Nation yesterday on condition of anonymity.
According to him, the new fixed price of Paracetamol 500 mg tablet has been increased from 70 paisa to Tk 1.20.Prices of some drugs have increased by more than 100 per cent. “The price at which medicine could be bought earlier, now you have to pay twice as much for the same drugs,” he added.
Sources said the government has the power to increase the prices of 117 medicines listed for the primary healthcare.
Health Ministry officials said the drug pricing committee of the government allowed to revise the price of the medicines due to various reasons including rising cost of raw materials used in drug production, excipients, packaging materials, transportation and distribution, dollar exchange rate and inflation.
When asked, Ayub Hossain, Director of DGDA said, “Since independence, the drug administration has been determining the prices of the listed medicines. There is a matter of re-evaluating the prices of these drugs and fixing their new prices. It is not the case that drug prices have suddenly increased. The price has not been re-evaluated for a long time.”
He said that there is a shortage of medicines in the market due to various reasons including increasing the price of raw materials. Companies are not encouraged to manufacture certain drugs. After reviewing everything, the government has updated the prices of these medicines on the advice of the DGDA’s Price Control Committee.
