Special protection to be given to domestic pharmacies

Kathmandu / Jan 7: The Ministry of Health and Population is to make effective management of medicine by giving special protection to the domestic pharmaceutical industries.

The 15th meeting of the Drugs Advisory Council chaired by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Health and Population, Upendra Yadav, today held discussions on determining the drug price, formation of the monitoring committee and effective drug administration.

The meeting decided to strengthen the Department of Drug Administration, production of quality and standard drugs and managing the import of drugs, the Ministry stated in a press release today.

The meeting has also decided to hold consultations among the Ministry officials, drug producers and importers for managing the medicines in the coming days.

On the occasion, DPM Yadav stressed that attention should be given while formulating the statute of the Drug Act so that the price of drugs be determined in such a way that the general public can afford it.

He instructed the officials and stakeholders to also pay attention to the quality of drugs and maintaining the price balance as well as to enhance the quality of drugs and the production capacity by protecting the domestic pharmaceutical industries.

DPM and Health Minister Yadav also called for import substitution in drugs. He urged the pharmaceutical industry operators to give their attention to increasing quality products and to abide by the WHO standard. He assured them that the complexities related to issuing license and renewal of the same would be removed. The DPM said attention would be given towards managing the human resources as well. RSS