Medication shortages have become a critical global issue, affecting both developed and developing nations, with significant impacts on patient care and healthcare systems between 2021 and 2024.

In the United States, drug shortages reached a record high of 323 medications in early 2024, including essential sterile injectable drugs such as chemotherapy agents and emergency medications, driven by manufacturing issues, supply chain gaps, and rising demand for specific treatments.

Chemotherapy drugs like carboplatin and cisplatin were among the most affected in the U.S., leading to rationing, treatment delays, and altered regimens for new patients, which exacerbated disparities in cancer care.

In Europe, shortages of antibiotics like penicillin and amoxicillin, as well as painkillers such as paracetamol, were particularly acute during peak winter demand, prompting the European Commission to propose emergency measures like stockpiling and fast-tracking approvals for alternative suppliers.

France reported 4,925 drug shortages in 2023, including critical oncology medications, which disrupted treatment schedules and heightened anxiety among patients, leading to calls for greater transparency in pharmaceutical production and stock monitoring.

In Egypt, shortages of essential medications such as insulin, chemotherapy drugs, and anesthetics were exacerbated by raw material detentions at ports, currency exchange issues, and smuggling to conflict zones, severely impacting patient care in hospitals and pharmacies.

Patients in Egypt faced severe health complications due to shortages of insulin and other diabetes medications, with many resorting to reduced dosages or alternative treatments, leading to increased hospitalizations and long-term health risks.

China experienced severe shortages of fever-reducing drugs like ibuprofen during its abrupt relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions, as daily demand far exceeded production capacity, prompting government interventions to stabilize supply chains and prevent price hikes.

In Lebanon, the lack of multiple sclerosis medications posed serious risks, including permanent paralysis for patients unable to access their prescribed treatments, underscoring the critical need for organized drug distribution systems.

Geopolitical events, such as the Russian-Ukrainian war, further disrupted global supply chains, increasing energy costs and reducing pharmaceutical production capacity, which compounded medication shortages worldwide.

Trade restrictions, including export bans on raw materials from major producers like China, strained global medication supplies, particularly for essential drugs such as antibiotics and painkillers, as countries prioritized domestic needs over international distribution.

Supply chain vulnerabilities were highlighted by the reliance on imported active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) from China and India, which created significant risks during periods of rising demand and inflation, particularly in the European Union.

In the United States, opaque supply chains and the concentration of production in countries like China and India exacerbated shortages of critical drugs, forcing hospitals to ration medications and underscoring the fragility of global pharmaceutical supply chains.

Inflation and rising raw material costs in Egypt led pharmaceutical companies to deplete strategic stocks, while authorities negotiated with manufacturers to stabilize prices and ensure the availability of essential medications.

Demand spikes also played a significant role in shortages, as seen in the U.S., where sales of cold and flu medications doubled in some areas during the flu season, exacerbating supply chain constraints and production delays.

In Europe, countries like Spain and Germany faced critical shortages of antibiotics and pediatric medications due to increased demand from respiratory infections and weakened immunity post-COVID-19, compounded by inflation and high energy costs.

In Germany, shortages of fever syrups and blood pressure drugs were attributed to cost pressures driving production to Asia, where shipping delays further disrupted domestic supply, forcing pharmacies to find substitutes or produce alternatives at higher costs.

Healthcare systems worldwide implemented various strategies to cope with shortages, including rationing care, switching to alternative drugs, and adjusting treatment plans, as evidenced by a survey where 99% of U.S. hospital pharmacists reported shortages.

In response to chemotherapy drug shortages, hospitals prioritized completing treatment regimens for existing patients while altering protocols for new patients, such as switching medications or adjusting dosing schedules.

The European Commission proposed measures such as a voluntary solidarity mechanism, joint procurement, and extending drug shelf life to address shortages, while encouraging domestic production to mitigate future crises.

In Taiwan, the Ministry of Health and Welfare established a centralized drug shortage treatment center and optimized supply chain communication to ensure stable availability of essential medications.

In rural China, the government prioritized drug distribution to underserved areas by coordinating daily dispatch systems, expanding production capacity, and promoting the use of traditional Chinese medicine to alleviate shortages.

The U.S. government proposed allocating $3.26 billion to $5.11 billion over the next decade to address supply chain fragmentation and incentivize manufacturers to produce generic drugs, alongside recommendations for increased FDA authority to enhance transparency.

Pharmaceutical companies increasingly relied on predictive analytics and AI-driven tools to address supply chain disruptions, enabling real-time adjustments to forecasts and operations based on fluid market conditions.

Global initiatives, such as the WHO's Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator, aimed to mitigate shortages in developing countries by procuring antiviral drugs at low costs and increasing access to screening tools.

The World Health Organization (WHO) collaborated with industry and manufacturers to improve access to essential medicines like insulin by diversifying production, regulating prices, and strengthening local manufacturing capacities in underserved areas.

In response to acute crises, WHO coordinated with partners to deliver emergency medical supplies, such as the shipment of 30 tons of essential drugs and surgical supplies to Sudan, ensuring immediate distribution to health facilities affected by conflict-related disruptions.

The Tupaia platform, used in Pacific Island countries, aggregated real-time data from health facilities to track medical supplies and facilitate redistribution during shortages, preventing disruptions in patient care.

In Ireland, draft legislation allowed pharmacists to substitute medications during shortages and expanded their role in prescribing certain drugs, aiming to alleviate pressure on healthcare systems and address the shortage of over 350 medicines.

Mark Cuban's Cost Plus Drug Company partnered with Community Health Systems to directly supply hospitals with essential drugs like epinephrine, addressing shortages through transparent pricing and innovative manufacturing processes.

The COVID-19 pandemic continued to disrupt global supply chains post-2021, leading to shortages of critical medical supplies such as molecular and immunoassay kits, life-support machines, and drugs due to raw material and transportation interruptions.

Medication shortages disproportionately impacted vulnerable populations, such as those in rural areas, where logistical challenges and insufficient production capacity exacerbated the issue, leading to delays in drug delivery and limited access to essential treatments.

Low-income communities faced heightened disparities during shortages, as smaller healthcare facilities often lacked the resources to stockpile medications, leaving patients unable to access necessary treatments or travel to larger centers with better supplies.

In some cases, patients in underserved areas were forced to ration medications or rely on alternative therapies, which sometimes led to adverse health outcomes, highlighting the need for improved coordination and equitable distribution systems.

Medication shortages have become a critical global issue, affecting both developed and developing nations, with significant impacts on patient care and healthcare systems between 2021 and 2024.

Title:

Content: Meitu
The first quarter of the United States serious drug shortage 323 drugs urgent cancer patients also have to be diverted and rationed!
CHU HENG NETWORK NEWS CENTER 2024-04-16 10: 42
According to the latest data from the American Society of Health System Pharmacists (ASHP) and the Utah Center for Drug Information Services, a total of 323 drugs in the United States were in severe shortages in the first quarter of this year, surpassing the record of 320 in 2014.
Among the drugs affected are the widely used diabetes drugs Ozempic and Mounjaro, the allergy treatment drug adrenaline, the common antibiotic amoxicillin for children, chemotherapy drugs and injections commonly used in hospitals in intensive care.
ASHP CEO Paul Abramowitz said in a statement that almost all categories of drugs are facing shortages, with non-patented sterile injectable drugs, including cancer chemotherapy drugs, and emergency drugs stored in hospital emergency vans and operating areas, the shortage of such drugs is the most worrying.
According to the American Cancer Society, chemotherapy is one of the top five drugs most affected by the shortage, which threatens to have a devastating impact on patients, and some hospitals and clinics say doctors have had to divert patients to ration their medications because of a shortage of some chemotherapy drugs.
In addition, ASHP noted that the continued nationwide shortage of ADHD drugs is “a problem for clinicians and patients. ”
The shortage of popular drugs is even more acute, with Mounjaro, the diabetes drug known as the “slimming pill ”, already in dire straits.
In response, Lilly said that the “unprecedented surge in demand ” for Mounjaro and its similar drug Zepbound has led to a shortage in the market, which the company is struggling to cope with.
Lilly is ramping up investments to boost production at Mounjaro and Zepbound in the second half of 2024.
The company said it expects intermittent supply disruptions in the near term due to unprecedented demand.
How to cure the drug shortage
The last major “drug shortage ” in U.S. history occurred in 2014, and it has only been alleviated in the years since.
Since 2021, the drug shortage situation seems to be increasing, and scholars in the field of medical health and economics in the United States believe that the reason for most drug shortages in the United States is the fragmentation of the drug supply chain.
The White House this month proposed spending between $3.26 billion and $5.11 billion over the next decade to help address the nation ’ s drug shortage.
The bill requires approval and funding from the U.S. Congress.
U.S. researchers and policymakers believe that a complete solution to the “drug shortage ” may require changes to the business model of the U.S. pharmaceutical industry, including measures to increase the price of generic drugs to attract more drug manufacturers.
Policymakers recommend giving the FDA more power to access more information about drug shortages and impending shortages.
Currently, the FDA relies primarily on phone calls to manufacturers asking if they can increase their supply to understand the situation.
The American Society of Health System Pharmacists said it is working with the federal government to advise the government on measures to address the drug shortage, including that Congress should require manufacturers to be more transparent on any supply chain issues and encourage more diversity in supply chains.
According to Abramowitz, “The federal government still has a lot of work to do to fundamentally address drug shortages, and the American Society of Health System Pharmacists will continue to engage regularly with policymakers to guide them in drafting and passing new legislation to address drug shortages and continue to advocate vigorously for proven solutions on behalf of our members. ”

In the United States, drug shortages reached a record high of 323 medications in early 2024, including essential sterile injectable drugs such as chemotherapy agents and emergency medications, driven by manufacturing issues, supply chain gaps, and rising demand for specific treatments.

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Content: General Supervision
Elham Aboul Fath
Editor-in-Chief
Thank you for your patience.
General Supervision
Elham Aboul Fath
Editor-in-Chief
Thank you for your patience.
An Unexpected Catastrophe in the World ’ s Largest Country: The Complete Story of U.S. Drug Shortages
The deficit is at a record level.
According to data from the American Society of Health System Pharmacists and the University of Utah Drug Information Service, organizations began tracking drug shortages for the first time in 2001. Steady since 2021 – now reaching a record high of 323 drugs in the first three months of 2024.
Paul Abramowitz, CEO of the American Society of Health System Pharmacists, wrote in a blog post on Thursday: “It ’ s been a long time to end drug shortages, ” and wrote:“ All drug classes are vulnerable to shortages, some of the most worrisome shortages include sterile injectable generic drugs, including cancer chemotherapy drugs and emergency drugs stored in hospital vans and procedural areas. It is dangerous for doctors and patients. ”
In addition to the 32 chemotherapy drugs that are deficient, the five categories of drugs with the greatest deficiency include central nervous system stimulants, antimicrobials, hormonal agents, and intravenous fluids. [1] The Drug Deficiency Database maintained by the American Society of Health System Pharmacists and the University of Utah is based on voluntary reports from practitioners, patients, and others that have been confirmed by manufacturers. The U.S. drug is in short supply, because it captures broader effects on service providers and patients.
The crisis has lasted a year and a half.
More than half of the treatment shortages have lasted for more than two years, according to an analysis by health consultancy IQVIA, and the average shortage affects at least half a million patients, many of them elderly, according to the US Office of Health and Human Services under the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, which shared its analysis with Congress in May.
Growing demand can play a role in drug shortages, as with the recent shortage of weight-loss drugs, but often manufacturing and quality problems, such as supply chain gaps and downtime, are the root cause. And varied.
But the American Society of Health System Pharmacists has “serious concerns ” about parts of this proposal, especially financial sanctions imposed on hospitals that lack the resources to comply with the recommendations, Abramowitz wrote:“ We all know that managing shortages is not enough and is not a sustainable solution to the worsening crisis, and there is still a lot of work to be done at the federal level to fix the root causes of drug shortages. ”
Why Shortage Occurs
Shortages can be caused by high demand, as with the recent shortage of weight-loss drugs, but this is not usually the main problem.
The FDA also blames manufacturing and quality problems, supply chain gaps, and downtime, and Dr. Emily Tucker, a drug shortage expert and an assistant professor of industrial engineering at Clemson University, says that when there is an indication of shortages, large health systems often also proactively place large orders, adding to the system ’ s stress.
“I don ’ t blame anyone.
“When I talk to all the stakeholders – whether it ’ s wholesalers, manufacturers, or the government – everyone wants this problem to end, ” she said.
Lack of transparency
Dr. Julie Grallo, chief medical officer and executive vice president of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, told the House Committee earlier that the shortage puts providers in a terrible position: “The drug shortage crisis is forcing providers to make impossible choices, and it is also hindering the development of new drugs. Health drugs are purchased only on a price basis, and manufacturers do not have to disclose the source of their acquisition of the ingredients.
The shortage of this generic chemical drug came due to the closure of one factory in India that manufactures the active ingredient after a surprise FDA inspection found “significant quality issues, ” says Jarallo:“ We didn ’ t know, and there was no transparency regarding the company ’ s supply of the majority of active pharmaceutical ingredients to all manufacturers across the board.
Knowing this in advance, we could have responded much faster, ” Dr. Steven Schundlemeyer, director of the PRIME Institute of the University of Minnesota School of Pharmacy, which focuses on economic and management issues, told the committee that as with defense contractors in the United States, New Zealand requires manufacturers to disclose their suppliers, and that information is required.
Easily accessible in the database.
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Chemotherapy drugs like carboplatin and cisplatin were among the most affected in the U.S., leading to rationing, treatment delays, and altered regimens for new patients, which exacerbated disparities in cancer care.

Title:

Content: As drug shortage list grows, many hospitals face tough decisions on rationing care

More than half of hospital pharmacists are reporting a critical shortage of chemotherapy drugs and nearly all are reporting overall medicine supply gaps as prescription drug shortages near an all time high, according to a new survey.

Hospital pharmacists said drug shortages have forced 1 in 3 health systems to delay, cancel or ration care or switch to alternate drugs to continue to treat patients. And 99% are reporting some drug supply shortages, an American Society of Health-System Pharmacists survey of more than 1,000 pharmacists released Thursday found.

The organization reported shortages of 309 drugs, near the all-time high of 320 shortages in 2014. The scarcity of key drugs is prompting hospitals to find or substitute drugs and change treatment plans as needed.

“In some cases, there are no alternatives to the affected drugs, which puts patients at risk," ASHP Chief Executive Officer Paul W. Abramowitz said in a statement. "This issue requires quick action from Congress to address the underlying causes of shortages and ensure patients have the medications they need.”

Cancer drug shortages

In June, the Food and Drug Administration said it will temporarily allow overseas drug manufacturers to import some chemotherapy drugs.

The FDA allowed Qilu Pharmaceutical, a drug manufacturer in China, to import the injectable chemotherapy drug cisplatin in 50-milligram vials. Toronto pharmaceutical company Apotex Corp. will distribute the medication in the United States.

More than a dozen cancer drugs have been in shortage in recent months, including cisplatin and carboplatin, used to treat lung, breast, prostate and gynecologic cancers. The National Cancer Institute said cisplatin and similar drugs are prescribed for 10% to 20% of all cancer patients.

In June, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network released a survey of 27 academic cancer centers that found 93% reported shortages of carboplatin and 70% faced shortages of cisplatin.

When cancer hospitals face such shortages, they attempt to make sure there's enough medication for patients to finish the course of treatment, said Mike Ganio, ASHP's senior director of pharmacy practice and quality.

Cancer hospitals facing such shortages might change medications for new patients starting on chemotherapy, said Ganio, a former pharmacy manager at an academic cancer center.

"You try to keep that patient on the same regimen as much as you can, unless they're failing it for some reason, and then you would switch," Ganio said.

Steroids, hormonal drugs also in short supply

More than 1 in 5 hospital pharmacists also reported shortages for steroids, hormonal drugs and oral liquids such as lidocaine, ibuprofen and amoxicillin.

A smaller number of pharmacists said heart medications, emergency prefilled syringes and drugs used for intensive care unit patients were in short supply. Others reported shortages of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder medicines, antimicrobial drugs and injectable opioids.

In all, about two-thirds of pharmacists said the shortages were "moderately impactful," which means they are managing shortages but patients are affected.

Pharmacists are managing the shortages by offering therapeutic alternatives, buying different vial sizes or concentrations and rationing medicines.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Survey: Drug shortages are widespread, hospitals ration care

In Europe, shortages of antibiotics like penicillin and amoxicillin, as well as painkillers such as paracetamol, were particularly acute during peak winter demand, prompting the European Commission to propose emergency measures like stockpiling and fast-tracking approvals for alternative suppliers.

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Content: Brussels is planning for EU countries to share vital medicines and take emergency measures to avoid a repeat of shortages that hit the bloc a year ago.

The European Commission is proposing a “voluntary solidarity mechanism” requested by France and Germany and an early warning system flagging when drugs become scarce, according to draft proposals seen by the Financial Times. If insufficient donors come forward, EU capitals will be allowed to tap into an EU-funded stockpile set up during the Covid-19 pandemic and take other emergency measures.

In December and January western countries suffered a shortage of antibiotics including penicillin and amoxicillin, and painkillers such as paracetamol, especially in medicines used by children.

Among the emergency measures floated to prevent a repeat of that crisis, the commission could allow the extension of a drug’s shelf life, fast track approvals of alternative suppliers and support production increases.

Brussels will also encourage joint procurement of drugs from 2024 and medicine swaps with countries in the southern hemisphere, where peak winter demand happens at a different time.

The commission will draw up guidance for national stockpiles in 2024 and establish a Critical Medicines Alliance bringing governments, industry and civil society together. The commission declined to comment.

Three-quarters of countries reported a worsening of drug shortages in 2022, according to an industry survey. EU manufacturing is heavily reliant on imported active pharmaceutical ingredients from China and India.

Rising demand and disruption to supply chains have been compounded by inflation hitting the production of generic drugs, which typically sell at much lower prices than branded versions.

France has been actively encouraging the reshoring of basic medicine supply, with a giant paracetamol factory set to open in the country next year.

The EU is discussing whether to provide more funding for domestic production.

The commission’s proposal is scheduled to be approved on October 25 and could still change. Initially non-binding, it could lead to a Critical Medicines Act, with Brussels drawing up a list of vital medicines by year-end.

The commission also urges member states and the European parliament to approve its overhaul of pharmaceutical legislation, put forward in April. It includes plans to take control of drug production in the event of a public health emergency, a requirement for stockholders to inform Brussels of supply levels and for manufacturers to give early warnings of shortages.

An analysis by the European Medicines Agency and the commission found that unless there is unexpected demand the EU should avoid an antibiotics shortage this year.

“The information available today suggests that — if demand in the coming winter season does not differ significantly from the demand of recent years — the supply to the EU of key antibiotics seems to generally match demand,” the analysis said.

“However, this depends strongly on the compliance of industry with their legal obligations to ensure supply and their ability to adapt.”

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2023. All rights reserved.
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France reported 4,925 drug shortages in 2023, including critical oncology medications, which disrupted treatment schedules and heightened anxiety among patients, leading to calls for greater transparency in pharmaceutical production and stock monitoring.

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Content: French health groups put forward proposals to limit the damage of worsening drug shortages

Medicines such as cough syrup, lozenges and ointment are seen on a table in an apartment in Berlin, Tuesday, December 20, 2022. Copyright Stephanie Pilick/dpa via AP
Copyright Stephanie Pilick/dpa via AP
By Lauren Chadwick
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Pharmaceutical companies’ lack of transparency leads to rising drug prices and less control over public resources, the group of health organisations say.

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A group of French organisations have called for more transparency from pharmaceutical companies as drug shortages increase.

In a joint report, 14 civil society organisations outlined their recommendations to solve a “situation that has only worsened” since 2018.

The French medicines regulator signalled 4,925 drug shortages in 2023, compared to 3,761 in 2022 and 2,160 in 2021.

A 2024 survey from France Assos Santé, which represents patients, found that 44 per cent of people in France said they had faced a drug shortage this year.

One of the pharmacy unions in France has even planned a strike at the end of the month over drug shortages and what they say is worsening access to care.

Each health organisation contributed an article with recommendations for dealing with the drug shortages.

The League Against Cancer urged complete transparency on drug shortages and potential substitutions for health professionals.

They also called for monitoring of medicine stocks and their location in the country to guarantee equal access.

The organisation found in a survey published in February that 78 per cent of health professionals in oncology had been faced with a drug shortage.

Drug shortages or delays have led to anxiety among cancer patients, lost time, and worsening symptoms, the organisation said.

France Assos Santé, meanwhile, wrote that an urgent response should not be to support “the industrial sector which bears serious responsibilities” for abandoning the production of less profitable drugs, relocating drug production, and keeping insufficient medicine stocks.

They would like any cost increases justified by production costs or the risk of withdrawing a drug from the market due to it being unprofitable. They called for cost evaluations to be made public.

Their concerns also range from the use of public money to bring drug production to Europe to new government plans to prevent shortages.

Some changes at the EU level criticised

Last year, the European Commission announced several measures to reform the pharmaceutical industry and address critical drug shortages.

The European Parliament went on to adopt a position on pharmaceutical reform last month, that included “incentives for innovation” and an effort to limit overuse of antibiotics.

The non-profit organisation Prescrire, which focuses on information about medicine, wrote in a chapter they contributed to the report that while some of the European Commission’s measures were welcome, others were concerning.

One of the many measures they rejected included the Commission’s proposal to reduce the number of days of scientific evaluation of drugs from 210 to 180, which they said was necessary time rather than an “administrative obstacle”.

While the NGO welcomed some measures such as government drug shortage prevention plans, it said the Commission should allow EU states to require pharmaceutical companies to have safety stocks of medicine and sanction those that do not respect them.

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French consumer organisation UFC-Que Choisir and the European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) said that they had hoped MEPs would shorten the length of time for “data protection” to allow generic medicines to be marketed more quickly.

Instead, MEPs approved shortening the period to 7.5 years, “which is almost the same duration as the current 8 years [yet] within the framework of the text adopted by Parliament, companies can gain additional months of protection under certain conditions to reach a total of 8.5 years,” UFC-Que Choisir said.

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In Egypt, shortages of essential medications such as insulin, chemotherapy drugs, and anesthetics were exacerbated by raw material detentions at ports, currency exchange issues, and smuggling to conflict zones, severely impacting patient care in hospitals and pharmacies.

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Content: Crowding citizens in front of the ambulance pharmacy reveals the extent of suffering …
6.
The suffering of poor patients is due to the lack of medicines.
Where the pharmaceutical market has been suffering for several consecutive months from a severe shortage in many varieties.. Which prompted citizens to crowd in front of the ambulance pharmacy in long queues to buy those shortcomings after they disappeared from all pharmacies..
Hustle...
Chaos...
Hundreds of men and women crowded in long queues that extend for several hours.. This is the scene in front of the ambulance pharmacy in the center of the country. People with chronic diseases of sugar, pressure, heart, nerves and colon became their only hope to find essential drugs for them in the pharmacy.. The absence of these drugs does not only expose them to more pain but may expose them to death.. They can not do without them..
The drug shortage crisis.
It is not a new crisis, but it has been repeated many times during the previous term of Minister “Khaled Abdel Ghaffar ”.. Instead of trying to solve the crisis, the government is going against the trend, where the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Health Dr.“ Khaled Abdel Ghaffar ” in statements after the government statement to parliament to the need to increase the prices of medicine in Egypt because it is the cheapest in the world and sold abroad by 50 times. According to the data of the Medbelle global platform for health care and funded by the European Fund for Regional Development in 2021, Egypt is ranked ninth in the list of cheapest countries in the world in the sale of medicine, and did not come in the first place as mentioned by the minister
Despite the repeated statements of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Health to resolve the crisis and provide the missing medicines, and despite the government ’ s repeated talk about the localization of the pharmaceutical industry in Egypt, the reality is quite the opposite.
There are a number of terrible complaints about the lack of medicine in public hospitals and pharmacies, including a collective complaint from the patients of the university hospitals in Assiut Governorate of the lack of availability of drugs and the absence of dye injections, which puts their lives at risk. Although the patients filed a complaint to the governor two weeks ago, but to no avail. The long queue of two or three hours to win a box of insulin Maxtard despite the increase in the price from 60 pounds to 93 pounds confirms the extent of suffering experienced by patients. Also, the disappearance of Indoxan injections used in chemotherapy sessions threatens oncology patients, where thousands of patients in oncology institutes and hospitals suffer from delayed chemotherapy sessions for lack and disappearance of Indoxan injection. The right to medicine, but the crisis still exists.
There is also a shortage of many drugs, including blood thinners and clots solvents, drugs for the treatment of cancerous tumors, multiple sclerosis drugs, drugs for the treatment of liver diseases, drugs for stomach ulcers and blood pressure, drugs for sinuses, heart and thyroid diseases, dozens of types of analgesics, antibiotics and vitamins, as well as anesthetics used in anesthesia and solutions in public hospitals. Subsidized children, which was exploited by the mafia of the black market to raise prices to double the original price of milk can up to 500 pounds..
All types of treatments for epilepsy, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, phobias and hyperactivity disease are still unavailable due to the lack of import of raw materials.
Health Insurance Patients
The crisis is not limited to hospitals and pharmacies only, but the branches of health insurance suffer from a large shortage of medicine and also medical supplies, which led to the closure of the operating rooms in the branches of insurance in the province of Beni Suef..
In the health insurance clinics in Cairo and Giza, many of those who frequent these clinics complained that they come from 7 am to reserve their roles in order to dispense their medicines and end up sitting in the pharmacy waiting for the pharmacist who dispenses them some of them, and the rest of their medicines are separated in new prescriptions to be dispensed from the insurance pharmacies, if any. Blood thinners and thrombotic solvents, some pressure medications, multiple sclerosis medications, stomach ulcer and thyroid medications, sugar, antibiotics, vitamins, Parkinson ’ s medications, and hyperactivity protocol.
Many cases complained of the lack of their medicines, which they have been dispensing for years.. And they were dispensed periodically every two months for a year after the approval of the Drug Committee to dispense those medicines, including a special medicine liquidity imported medicines, and patients with diabetes and blood diseases were their complaint that any imported medicine and its price expensive requires the highest approval of a committee in the Council of Ministers..
Although patients have been dispensing the same medication for several years, this complaint is frequent from universal health insurance patients.
Detention of raw materials
Dr. Ali Auf, head of the pharmaceutical division of the Federation of Chambers of Commerce, said that the reason for the worsening of the shortage of medicines is the detention of raw materials in ports, pointing out that there are about 1000 items that are not available.
Exchange rate
Mahmoud Fouad, Executive Director of the Right to Medicine Association, said that the aggravation of the crisis is due to the companies stockpiling medicines in anticipation of higher prices, explaining that the crisis began about two years ago due to the shortage of raw materials as a result of the high exchange rate and the inability of companies to provide dollar materials to import raw materials.
Fouad stressed that there are more than 1000 drugs whose prices rose during the past year by rates ranging from 25% to 60%, pointing out that the increase reached during the current days to 60% for the local and 80% for the importer.
Fouad described the statements of the Minister of Health about the price of Egyptian medicine as being 50 times lower than abroad as shocking, pointing out that there was a successive movement of prices from the Drug Pricing Committee of the Egyptian Drug Authority starting in 2023, which resulted in the movement of about 1,000 varieties.
He explained that Egypt suffered during the last two years from the phenomenon of medicine shortage due to the shortage of imported raw materials as a result of the economic crisis and the fluctuation of the exchange rate … and the crisis affected items considered life-saving.
Fouad stressed that drug sales in Egypt reached about $3 billion a year in 2023 without the sales of the armed forces and the interior and tenders of the Ministry of Health, which means that Egypt is considered the largest market in the region.
Unfair pricing system
He explained that Egypt had been subject to the pricing of medicines for 10 years according to the decision of the Minister of Health under the system of "lower pricing for neighboring countries" and then the pricing was according to the decision 413 of 1991, which is "calculating the cost and profit margin for companies and distribution and then pharmacies" according to the compulsory pricing that began in 1988.
He explained that the pricing is according to the cheapest price in the reference countries identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 36 countries to guide their prices and the minister to take them or not, pointing out that these countries are the major industrial countries and have comprehensive health insurance laws, which Egypt lacks.
Fouad added that this system in pricing is unfair as medicine has become subject to market mechanisms, supply and demand and suspicions of monopoly, the price is controlled by the policy of supply and demand, which makes medicine a commodity sold to those who can, especially since there are more than millions of Egyptian people not participating in the health insurance system, which only 63% of citizens participate.
Fouad pointed out that Egypt has about 17 officially registered medicines, 90% of which are manufactured, 176 companies that own factories, 7 business sector companies, 22 branches of foreign companies and 1,200 commercial companies that do not own a factory.
He stressed that the crisis of medicine shortage and successive rises will make the Egyptian citizen groaning and unable to bear it.
Fouad warned of the danger of the expected increases in drug prices during the coming period.

Patients in Egypt faced severe health complications due to shortages of insulin and other diabetes medications, with many resorting to reduced dosages or alternative treatments, leading to increased hospitalizations and long-term health risks.

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Content: Chairman of Wafd Party
Dr. Abdul Sindh Yamama
Chairman of the Board of Directors
Dr. Ayman is an accountant.
Editor-in-Chief
I'm sorry.
My grandfather, Zainuddin.
Chairman of Wafd Party
Dr. Abdul Sindh Yamama
Chairman of the Board of Directors
Dr. Ayman is an accountant.
Editor-in-Chief
I'm sorry.
My grandfather, Zainuddin.
Smuggling burns drug stability
Libya and Sudan are the main destinations.
And the profits are huge.
Deficiencies include stents, heart medications, diabetes, pressure, and tumors.
It is an undeniable fact that the Egyptian pharmaceutical market is experiencing a crisis of shortage of some vital items on which citizens depend mainly, and at all levels, which exacerbated the suffering of patients in public hospitals affiliated to the government, which receive subsidized medicines at low prices, so that the so-called alternative class becomes a citizen ’ s refuge, to get the necessary dose of medicine, to alleviate his health suffering or save his life.
At a time when it is assumed that more than 90% of medicines are manufactured in Egypt, citizens' complaints about the lack of many medicines and medical supplies in the markets and hospitals are escalating to the extent that deputies submitted a number of requests for briefing through the deputies, stressing that the crisis lies in the raw material itself and imported in dollars.
And the pressure.
Thyroid and sugar.
The main reasons lie in the importation of 95% of raw materials in addition to the presence of “smuggling brokers ” whose mission is to smuggle Egyptian medicine to neighboring conflict countries, especially Libya and Sudan, in order to sell it abroad at exorbitant prices, and to reap huge profits, according to some pharmacists and specialists. In addition to Sudan ’ s import of Egyptian medicine in hard currency, especially with the licenses of Egyptian medicine compared to others and the stopping of factories in neighboring countries because of their conflicts.
According to Ali Abdullah, head of the Egyptian Society for Pharmaceutical Studies (an NGO), the lack of medicines and their disappearance from the local market is a real crisis in case of smuggling, such as insulin, tumors, anesthesia, surgical supplies, serums and vaccines.
The shortage of hard currency in Egypt is also one of the reasons for the disappearance of medicines.
Mahfouz Ramzi, head of the Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Committee at the Cairo Pharmacists Syndicate, pointed out that there are organized gangs that smuggle medicine to countries of conflicts and wars, explaining that “most operations are conducted through land border roads, and the Egyptian Drug Authority is responsible for inspecting companies, factories and any pharmaceutical institution, to ensure that medicines produced in Egypt are in the normal sequence until they reach pharmacies. ”“ Some smuggling professionals deal with drug stores, where they buy large quantities of medicines, take advantage of discounts on them, and then smuggle them abroad to take advantage of the price difference. ”
The Executive Director of the Egyptian Center for the Right to Medicine, Mahmoud Fouad, confirmed that "the drug stores have turned into an illegal business and a back gate for drug smuggling and expired drug trade, as most of them are not licensed and sold without invoices, and are not subject to the umbrella of the Ministry of Health, in addition to the lack of health standards required to practice the profession of pharmacy, after some stores are run from apartments away from the eyes of the Ministry of the control bodies. 90% of its owners are not pharmacists. ”
“Are these stores registered with the Ministry of Health?
And are they subject to pharmaceutical inspection or from the Drug Control and Research Authority? ”, stressing that most of the small pharmacies in the villages “do not have the ability to buy medicine from distribution companies, which makes them resort to buying from stores after agreeing on specific facilities and periods for payment, ” pointing out that“ popular medicines in Egypt are the most smuggled abroad. ” From 250 pounds ($8 at the official exchange rate).
According to Dr. Ashraf Hatem, Chairman of the Health Committee in Parliament, it is a social responsibility, and priorities must be set, and all parties sitting together may help to solve the crisis, in light of the apparent shortage of a number of medical drugs, and his demand that the Drug Authority publish periodically and daily alternatives to the missing medicines in the absence of the original medicine. In addition, the pharmaceutical industry continues to operate and produce.
For all this and for the continuation of the crisis of drug shortage it was necessary to search and investigate the causes and solutions!
During the meeting of Gamal al-Laith, Chairman of the Chamber of Pharmaceutical Industry at the Federation of Industries, in the presence of Minister of Health Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, the Governor of the Central Bank, Hassan Abdullah, and others, he sent letters of reassurance to the Egyptian people about the existence of a solution to pump the needs of the market of foreign currency to end the shortage of medicines. Or psychologically for the patient.
He said: « The medicines that suffer from the shortage, some of them are sugar drugs and other drugs tumors and drugs of the glands and heart, drugs related to chronic diseases, which is now being secured, and we as factories work with a stock of raw materials enough for 4-6 months, and this stock reached only weeks, and therefore we are now in the stage of risk, and therefore the government began to move ».
He added that the health sector is supported by the provision of foreign exchange resources to provide all needs according to a plan to deal with such circumstances, stressing the importance of full coordination between the unified purchasing authority and the pharmaceutical industry room as well as pharmaceutical companies to face any problems related to the shortage of supplies, medicines and medical consumables.
As well as a detailed presentation on the commitments implemented and not implemented in the period from June 2023 to January 2024, with regard to the provision of (medicines, medical supplies, laboratory supplies, devices, raw materials and packing materials), and the Minister was briefed on the results of the mechanisms established with the Central Bank of Egypt to pay the obligations in foreign currency to meet the demands of the health care sector.
In the end, the official spokesman stressed that the shortage of drugs does not exceed 15% and the drugs directed to tumors are at the forefront of the shortcomings because of their close link to the currency and what faces the supply chains, otherwise all drugs and within them are compatible... The complaints are due in their entirety to the lack of knowledge of citizens with the trade names of medicines.
In addition to the above, a severe shortage of anesthetic drugs, dental pening drugs, nephrology and recovery drugs, which will cause a real disaster that threatens the conduct of surgical operations for patients, and thus increase the waiting lists in hospitals and the occurrence of complications for patients that may result in loss of their lives.
The head of the medicine division of the Federation of Chambers of Commerce, Ali Ouf, revealed that a request will be submitted to the Egyptian Drug Authority early next week to move the prices of 1,500 items in light of what he described as developments in the situation and rising costs.
He pointed out that « the need to raise the wages of workers in the pharmaceutical sector to compensate them for the cost of living and therefore must raise salaries so that they can live in the current conditions and the sector will bear the increase of salaries at the expense of cost and raise the minimum insurance ».
On the shortage of medicines, Amin al-Dabraki, one of the dealers in the pharmaceutical market, said that the main reason for the crisis is the lack of active substances imported by companies.
This is mainly due to the dollar crisis, in addition to the withdrawal of some financial companies from the Egyptian pharmaceutical market.
On the inability of the Ministry of Health to move the prices of medicines with the movement of the exchange rate, he said that the solutions are the intervention of the state by providing a fixed customs dollar for pharmaceutical companies, while moving the prices of medicines, in addition to starting factories to produce active substances inside Egypt.

China experienced severe shortages of fever-reducing drugs like ibuprofen during its abrupt relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions, as daily demand far exceeded production capacity, prompting government interventions to stabilize supply chains and prevent price hikes.

Title:

Content: The Chinese Antibiotic Effect and the Two-Sided Ibuprofen
On December 7, a critical day for China ’ s epidemic prevention, the Chinese government took a sharp turn in its three-year COVID-19 strategy. The government ’ s policy direction quickly shifted from “zero ” to“ relax ”. Late on December 26, the Chinese National Health Commission announced a complete lifting of the embargo. One of the most important policy changes.
No matter whether the policy changes or changes, for the people of the mainland, the short and medium term future scenario is like standing at the end of the tunnel in the movie "Full Start", but the heart is full of helplessness that can not see the light.
Since the outbreak of the epidemic in 2020, the mainland leader Xi Jinping has bet the legitimacy of the government on the “new crown zero ”, implementing large-scale containment and centralized isolation, but the goal is to“ zero ”, but it has triggered the “people ’ s war – white paper revolution ” that broke out at the end of November.
Looking back at 2022, countries around the world are facing different difficulties, and the new coronavirus (now renamed Covid-19) is definitely one of the most difficult tests in China, which has experienced the closure of Shanghai in the spring, the surge of the epidemic in the summer, the resumption of the blockade in the autumn and the resolute opening up in the winter.
In March of the spring, the COVID-19 situation was in full bloom, forcing the Shanghai authorities, who had vowed not to seal the city, to announce, without warning, the second-stage divisional closure of the “semi-closed city ”.
Shanghai residents jokingly said that the local epidemic prevention and control by the streets and communities before the grid screening, upgraded to river control, as if the "nine palace grid" into a "double wok".
AmCham China ’ s president, Colm Rafferty, described companies “standing at the end of the tunnel but not seeing the light ” in a survey released in May that found more than half of Chinese and American companies were willing to delay or reduce their investments and revise their 2022 revenue estimates.
After a strict epidemic prevention in the spring, Shanghai announced the lifting of the seal on June 1 in the hot summer, but the new coronavirus did not let people breathe for a moment, and the epidemic quickly broke out in Sichuan, Guangdong, Hebei, Liaoning, Guizhou and other places.
Expectations of many parties to repair economic losses have been frustrated, and the confidence of multinational companies in China has been ambushed by this outbreak.
In the autumn of the determination and re-blockade, Xi Jinping stressed the determination to adhere to the "dynamic zero" at the 20th CPC National Congress.
According to the BBC, from March to October, a total of 152 prefecture-level cities in China were partially or completely blocked, affecting a total of more than 280 million people, including 114 cities that were blocked from August to October.
Winter resolutely relaxed, and on December 7, China officially announced its opening, after the outbreak of the white paper revolution in China blossomed across the country, leading public opinion to attribute this to the key driving force behind China's sharp turn.
After Relaxing the Epidemic
Chinese people's living beings.
However, the answer to China's thunderous unsealing and opening up has quickly become an irrelevant issue, and with the outbreak of the epidemic in various parts of the country, shortages of drugs, drug snatches, medical collapse, suspension of work and production, and even unemployment have become the living faces of the Chinese people.
In fact, as early as December, before the junior high school government announced the relaxation of epidemic prevention, the new crown of wildfire has been ignited in various parts of the country, but it has not yet overturned its cards.
In November, Foxconn Zhengzhou factory 's "escape epidemic" memory is still fresh, the factory was torn into two worlds by epidemic prevention, many factories implemented closed management, employees fear isolation and staged a big escape drama, the goal is a possible "drug-free world" outside the factory, and this depends on where the escape destination points.
Mike Ryan, executive director of the World Health Organization ’ s (WHO) public health emergency program, recently pointed out that in terms of time, the explosion of confirmed cases in China has nothing to do with the release of the whole territory, because cases have begun to surge long before the epidemic has been relaxed, and Chinese officials have warned that Beijing is falling and the number of confirmed cases is rising rapidly.
What will China look like after the lifting of the blockade and what kind of difficulties will it face?
According to the WHO, after the end of the zero clearance policy, the authorities turned to relaxation and epidemic prevention, and immediately announced the lifting of the blockade of the entire territory in less than a month, and the policy ignored the reality of the situation and jumped again and again, resulting in frequent chaos across China.
In contrast, the tide of people for nucleic acid testing is much milder, in contrast to those who have been waiting for testing.
In May this year, the "nucleic acid sampling circle" policy created a job vacancy for samplers, with the official policy shift to non-essential nucleic acid testing, the original premises for nucleic acid testing are either abolished or discontinued, samplers are also facing unemployment after the sunset of this policy, and enterprises that previously invested in nucleic acid testing related layout have also tightened production.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare of Taiwan has confirmed that there has been a large number of acquisitions and intends to develop a limited purchase order.
In addition, China's industrial and commercial activities have also been hit hard, because the explosion of diagnosis caused factories and logistics personnel to become tight, lack of work caused industrial chain and production chain failure, automotive semiconductor giant, Japanese Renesas Electronics (Renesas) in Beijing also suffered, due to the lack of manpower in the factory to cope with the operation of the production line, Renesas recently closed for several days.
When Covid-19 becomes Covid-19
How does the Chinese epidemic develop?
The official policy continues.
The health committee announced the full unsealing of the 26th late night, and announced that on January 8, the new coronavirus infection was adjusted from "Class B A" to "Class B".
The next day, the relevant policies will be gradually increased, including five supporting documents, will strengthen the trend and analysis of severe, critical and death cases, and in the short term, primary and secondary schools may still teach online.
Liang Wannian, head of the expert group of the National Health and Health Commission's COVID-19 response team, said that the initial increase in cases may lead to insufficient supply of drugs and public panic, and the focus will shift from infection prevention and control to medical treatment.
The Spring Festival, which claims to be the largest population movement on the surface, will begin on January 7, 2023. In order to avoid the rapid spread of the epidemic, the mainland government announced on the 26th that enterprises and institutions can take off-peak vacations according to the wishes of employees, and schools can start school on the wrong peak.
Zhong Nanshan, a Chinese epidemic prevention expert and academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, said he expects to return to pre-epidemic living conditions in the first half of next year.
However, it is still stressed that the current focus of prevention should shift from preventing infections to preventing severe diseases, and strengthening the vaccination of COVID-19 is the next key step.
China is expected to hit the peak of the new coronavirus tsunami in the next 1-2 weeks. Experts originally predicted that the total number of new coronavirus confirmed reports will reach 1.47 million by the end of July. However, with the full release of the epidemic prevention, the number of infections has exceeded expectations. This is a further test of whether the Chinese authorities can come up with a "witty war epidemic."
Focusing on the pain points of epidemic prevention in China, in addition to unsealing in the case of poor time and insufficient supporting equipment, medical collapse, pharmaceutical materials, and rapid screening agents are also seriously short, and some businesses have taken advantage of the opportunity to bid up prices.
In response, the authorities recently requisitioned more than 20 related pharmaceutical and medical products, through the provincial, city and county level cooperation, to strengthen the supply of drugs, masks and other epidemic prevention materials, revealing the official signal of steady supply.
In addition, a few days ago, it also issued a reminder of the price of epidemic materials and the order of competition, to solve the chaos of price hikes for epidemic prevention materials.
For non-essential non-nucleic acid testing policies, in the absence of monitoring data, experts believe that it will adversely affect the decision-making of the authorities and the effective allocation of resources is a potential problem.
Is there still good news after the outbreak?
World Pharmacy India Increases Exports of Fever Drugs
The number of people infected by the outbreak in China has soared at an alarming rate, surpassing what experts originally expected.
It is reported that China currently needs at least 400 million Ibuprofen tablets per day on average. However, as the country with the highest ibuprofen production capacity, it takes 40 days to produce 400 million tablets.
Sahil Munjal, chairman of India's Pharmaceutical Export Promotion Council (Pharmexcil), one of the world's largest pharmaceutical manufacturers, said on the 22nd that India is ready to increase exports of fever-reducing drugs to China.
Munjal said that China is currently facing a large shortage of antipyretic drugs, and that pharmaceutical manufacturers are working with the market on a quotation process for ibuprofen and paracetamol.
India ’ s foreign ministry spokesman Arindam Bagchi said it was keeping an eye on the progress of the epidemic in China, adding that “as a world pharmacy, we have been helping other countries. ”
In contrast to India, Germany and France in Europe have chosen to collect umbrellas on rainy days, and have successively issued restrictions on the purchase of medicines.
Due to the European flu outbreak, Germany and France also crossed the river, and nearly 10 million people were infected in Germany alone.
German TV 1 said that there are gaps in antipyretics, pain killers, antibiotics, anti-cancer drugs and even antihypertensive drugs and diabetes drugs, which not only affect niche products, but also affect many common drugs.
The German Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArm) currently lists 313 medicines as supply bottlenecks.
New crown drug ibuprofen
The G2 trade war China has never fought.
China is a big producer of ibuprofen, but now it is moving around the world, which is interesting.
In fact, ibuprofen has been referred to as a “rare earth ” weapon in the Sino-US trade war, and it is a weapon that China has never taken up.
According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, 95 percent of ibuprofen imported from the United States in 2018 came from China, and 80 percent of antibiotics were supplied by China.
Mike Wessel, a permanent member of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, has said that China is the main or potential sole supplier of some important drugs to the United States, and that over-reliance on China may be the biggest pain point for the United States.
Rosemary Gibson, a well-known American medical writer, has warned that the degree of dependence of the United States on China has reached the point where if China withdraws, it will affect the shutdown of the American medical system.
In 2020, when the epidemic in the United States was soaring, a Xinhua commentator once mentioned in an article that if China carried out strategic control on medical products exported to the United States, the United States society was afraid of being overwhelmed by the new coronavirus.
Now the plot is reversed, and the situation of the mainland people buying ibuprofen is staged from time to time.
China has launched a rush to buy ibuprofen, but according to the pharmaceutical industry report, the annual production of ibuprofen in mainland China accounts for 1 / 3 of the world's total, ranking first in the world.
The father of ibuprofen died three years ago.
Save people without making a dime.
Ibuprofen, known as the new crown drug, is now easily available in normal life, thanks to the authorization of inventor Stewart Adams, but Adams did not make any money in his pocket because of ibuprofen.
According to the BBC, aspirin was introduced in 1897 and is also a pain medicine. However, high doses of aspirin have caused allergic reactions, and the risk of side effects such as bleeding and indigestion is also high.
Many inventions were born by accident, and ibuprofen was not unexpected. Adams had a hangover and had an important speech the next day. In an emergency, he had to take about 600 mg of the drug, the predecessor of ibuprofen, and the effect was unexpected.
This invention made Boots a huge profit, and Adams did not make a dime.
Ibuprofen brought Adams an honorary doctorate in science from the University of Nottingham and a medal from the British Empire from the Queen in 1987, three years after his death in Nottingham, where he died at the age of 95.

In Lebanon, the lack of multiple sclerosis medications posed serious risks, including permanent paralysis for patients unable to access their prescribed treatments, underscoring the critical need for organized drug distribution systems.

Title:

Content: Wednesday 21 November 1445 AH - 29 May 2024 |
Programs
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Captain Bakhash presents the risks of drug shortage to patients with "multiple sclerosis" and its most prominent consequences
The “Lebanese Society of Multiple Sclerosis Patients ” held a press conference at the“ House of the Doctor ” – Furn El Shbak, during which the President of the Lebanese Doctors Association in Beirut, Prof. Youssef Bakhash, spoke about the dangers of the shortage of medicine and its repercussions on the health of the patient.
He said: “This press conference is being held today on the occasion of World MS Day.
This disease and like any chronic disease, the treatment of its patients falls on the responsibility of the state and the Ministry of Health and this is a national and humanitarian duty to care for these patients as we care for every patient who needs care, treatment or support.
Especially those with chronic diseases such as cancer, diabetes, kidney disease and other diseases. ”
He added: “With regard to MS, science, development and studies have discovered 17 drugs to treat these patients, but unfortunately, only three of the 17 drugs in Lebanon are supported by the ministry.
Today, my speech will revolve around three points, the first point that the Ministry of Health withdrew the support for 14 medicines and kept it on three, including one that makes the Lebanese interior, the voice we want to make is the need to make room in the field to support the largest number of these medicines that enable our patients to recover or at least stabilize their situation. ”
He continued: “The second issue is the continued existence of the drug in a way that meets the needs of these patients because any failure leads to serious consequences, the most serious of which is permanent paralysis.
The third point is the need to organize the distribution of the drug and deliver it to the treatment centers and make sure that the beneficiary is the patient who remains the first and most important goal. ”

Geopolitical events, such as the Russian-Ukrainian war, further disrupted global supply chains, increasing energy costs and reducing pharmaceutical production capacity, which compounded medication shortages worldwide.

Title:

Content: Experts have recorded a shortage of antibiotics in the world due to the increase in the number of infectious diseases.
On December 21, writes the Financial Times with reference to the head of the group of the World Health Organization (WHO) for the supply of medicines and ensuring access to them Lisa Hedman, reports Day.Az.
Twenty-eight of the 35 countries for which WHO collects data are deficient in penicillin-type drugs.
In the United States and Canada complained about the lack of amoxicillin.
Less is known about the situation in poor or small countries, according to Hedman.
It is noted that in addition to the difficulties experienced by pharmaceutical manufacturers in the pandemic, the current situation is complicated by high energy prices, and this leads to a decrease in profits of companies.
In addition, countries, according to Hedman, did not expect that in the first year without masks, respiratory infections would hit the population so hard.
In addition to antibiotics, pharmacists also complain about the lack of painkillers, drugs for tuberculosis and drugs for skin infections.

Trade restrictions, including export bans on raw materials from major producers like China, strained global medication supplies, particularly for essential drugs such as antibiotics and painkillers, as countries prioritized domestic needs over international distribution.

Title:

Content: Belambri reveals the reasons for the loss of 50 drug brands in Algeria
The President of the National Union of Private Pharmacists, Dr. Massoud Belambri, revealed the reasons for the absence of 40 to 50 pharmaceutical brands in Algeria
In an interview with Radio Setif, Belambri said: “The reasons are multiple, internal and external, and it is regrettable that we record a scarcity of medicines and the lack of regulation of the pharmaceutical market in Algeria, despite efforts and legal reforms, inspection, control and reporting. ”
Regarding external causes, the same speaker stressed that medicines are rare in many countries.
Similar to paracetamol, amoxicillin is known to decrease in all countries of the world such as Germany, France, Canada, Belgium, Italy, because of the scarcity of raw materials and high prices.
Countries that produce raw materials give priority to their domestic market.
As for the internal reasons, he drew attention to the conditional and inevitable sale in the internal market.
The sale discriminated between pharmacists, and some manufacturers abandoned the production of varieties of medicines because of the high cost price.
He also attributed the loss of some medicines to some legal texts that are not in line with the market, where he said: “It is illogical for the distributor to distribute medicines to other distributors because the original in the transaction the producer or importer supplies the distributor and the distributor supplies pharmacies. ”
The head of the National Union of Private Pharmacists, stressed that the wave of scarcity of raw materials globally did not reach Algeria, adding: "Producers use the available reserve stock" and must take measures to avoid aggravating the situation. "
In a related context, the same speaker called for the need to reconsider the prices of some medicines to ensure their availability and continued manufacture in the local market, stressing that the distributors will not be bitten by turning to major wholesalers and suppliers other distributors and that this behavior causes a major disruption in distribution.
He also urged the distribution of medicine from the distributor to the pharmacist directly and the tightening of control and inspection from the producer and importer to the distributor to the pharmacist.
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Supply chain vulnerabilities were highlighted by the reliance on imported active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) from China and India, which created significant risks during periods of rising demand and inflation, particularly in the European Union.

In the United States, opaque supply chains and the concentration of production in countries like China and India exacerbated shortages of critical drugs, forcing hospitals to ration medications and underscoring the fragility of global pharmaceutical supply chains.

Title:

Content: The New York Times Original
Continue reading Growing drug shortage in the United States has become a threat to national security
The shortage of medicines in the United States last year increased compared to 2021 by 30%, according to The New York Times.
However, the article notes that the growing shortage of inexpensive but critical drugs poses a national security threat to the United States.
The growing shortage of inexpensive but critical drugs poses a threat to U.S. national security and forces hospitals to make “terrible ” choices, writes The New York Times, citing a report prepared for hearings in the U.S. Senate.
According to this report, the shortage of medicines last year increased by almost 30% compared to 2021, with an average shortage of medicines observed for 18 months, and for some drugs – 15 years.
Among the drugs in short supply are conventional antibiotics and anesthetics, the article said.
Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat from Michigan and chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, said that these problems are related to economic factors, an opaque supply chain and the fact that 80% to 90% of some products are made abroad.
“Taken together, these underlying causes not only raise serious concerns about ensuring proper patient care, but also pose a serious threat to national security, ” Peters said.
Dr. Andrew Schumann, an oncology surgeon from Michigan, told senators at the hearing that the shortage of drugs in his field is "a tragedy occurring in slow motion."
As Schumann noted, recently due to the shortage of one cheap, but well-proven cancer drug, he had to choose which patients will receive this drug.
The article notes that many of the cheapest drugs tend to be made in countries such as India and China, where they are inexpensive to manufacture.
However, this concentration of production capacity creates an additional level of vulnerability to problems such as natural disasters and political unrest, emphasizes The New York Times.
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Inflation and rising raw material costs in Egypt led pharmaceutical companies to deplete strategic stocks, while authorities negotiated with manufacturers to stabilize prices and ensure the availability of essential medications.

Title:

Content: Chairman of the Board of Directors and Editors
Mohamad Elbaz
Chairman of the Board of Directors and Editors
Mohamad Elbaz
Egypt is the cheapest and the crisis will be resolved in two months.
Details of the press conference of the President of the Drug
Dr. Ali Al-Ghamrawi, head of the Drug Authority, said that the phenomenon of drug shortages exists globally and is not limited to Egypt, pointing out that a country like Saudi Arabia has 1372 drugs that are deficient according to an official statistics there.
This came during the press conference held by the President of the Drug Authority, today, to announce all developments related to the drug file, at the headquarters of the Egyptian Drug Authority in Mansouria.
He added that Ecovia gives statistics on the drug market month by month in Egypt with an accuracy of 92%, which confirmed that the shortage rate in Egypt is 7% in 2023 compared to 2022.
Al-Ghamrawi said that the reasons for the shortcomings are due to several reasons, most notably the shortage of raw materials, the rise of spare parts for production machines, in addition to the increase in the dollar exchange rate, stressing that inflation rates and the increase in the interest rate directly affect the price of medicine, pointing out that all these factors directly affect the price of the product.
He explained that the increase in the dollar price led to the tendency of companies to consume their strategic stocks for the production of pharmaceutical items, and after the easing of the dollar crisis and with the increase in the exchange rate, by extension, increased the price of imported raw materials and therefore increased the prices of pharmaceuticals.
He stressed that there will be a breakthrough in the crisis of drug shortages in two or two and a half months at the latest, after the availability of raw materials in the supply chains of companies.
Al-Ghamrawi explained that Egypt is the cheapest price of medicine in the world, pointing out that the raw materials that are imported from abroad at a time when the exchange rate of the dollar was less than the current time, which caused a difference in the price at the present time.
The President of the Drug Authority said that the Authority is negotiating with the drug companies to reduce the prices of some of their medicines and there is a response from a number of companies, adding that today a decision was signed to reduce the prices of medicines for two companies.
He stressed that there are drugs that will see a decrease during the coming period, and not only an increase, and the Authority aims to achieve the general interest of the patient.
He pointed out that there is a rule to increase the prices of medicine, so applications are not considered if the foreign exchange rate increases or decreases by 5% or 7%.
Reasons for requests to raise the price of medicine
Al-Ghamrawi stressed that the Authority is discussing with the pharmaceutical companies the reasons for their requests to raise the price of the drug, and the requests go through nine steps, until the final pricing is reached and the drug is not priced in a moment, but all aspects of the reasons for the price increase are discussed.
He explained that the importance of the Authority is the availability of medicines that are missing in the market, explaining that the Authority has a priority in the provision of medicines, which are medicines for chronic diseases.
Al-Ghamrawi explained that there is continuous control by the inspectors of the Authority on the factories during production, which determines the pricing of the drug through several important factors determined by the Authority with the companies.
He revealed the total campaigns launched during the period from January to protect the control of the pharmaceutical market, pointing out that 46 thousand inspection campaigns were launched on pharmacies and stores resulted in 5,700 violations, and 264 administrative closures, stressing that the Authority has a very strong inspection apparatus.
He stressed that Egypt has great potential in the manufacture of medicine, pointing out that Egypt is number one in the manufacture of medicine in the African continent.
He explained that Egypt has a large number of factories that produce medicine, making it one of the most important countries that make the impossible in Egypt.
He pointed out that there are agreements between the Egyptian Drug Authority and some African countries to provide medicines in Egypt, pointing out that there are five countries have agreements between them and the Authority and there is an expansion in the African market during the coming period.
The head of the Egyptian Pharmaceutical Authority confirmed that the private sector contributes 95% of the production in Egypt and 5% of the production is owned by the government sector.
Al-Ghamrawi explained that this percentage does not cause any crisis because there is continuous cooperation between the local private sector and the Authority in the provision and distribution of medicines, pointing out that 91% of every 100 medicine packs in the market are manufactured in Egypt by factories owned by local pharmaceutical companies (74%) and 26% by international companies.
He pointed out that there are 12 examples of drugs, pointing out that if there is no specific class there are examples and alternatives available, which must be addressed by the citizen, which is the search for analogues and not for the trade name.

Demand spikes also played a significant role in shortages, as seen in the U.S., where sales of cold and flu medications doubled in some areas during the flu season, exacerbating supply chain constraints and production delays.

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Texan / What Makes Pharmacy Shelves Empty?
Supermarkets and pharmacies in many parts of the United States have recently encountered varying degrees of "drug shortage", many over-the-counter drugs have been snapped up, and online sales channels are also seriously out of stock.
The reasons for this can be broadly divided into the sudden surge in demand, the unfavorable supply situation, and the "panic" caused by the expected future demand for drugs.
Sales of colds at U.S. retailers jumped 35% in November from a year earlier, and sales of throat sprays and throat lotion rose 56%. The recent increase in sales enthusiasm for these drugs is evident.
Even without relying on data, the empty shelves in supermarkets and pharmacies are enough to explain the problem.
In particular, those popular drugs that relieve the symptoms of children's colds are more difficult to find.
The epidemic itself has greatly increased the "need for drugs" as the primary cause.
The impact of COVID-19, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), multiple epidemics have increased the demand for these drugs.
Especially for parents looking after sick children, it is unrealistic to ask them to be patient and wait for medication.
This has also forced these parents to "sweep" around, and the rush for drugs has naturally spread.
In addition to the increase in demand directly caused by the families of the epidemic, the news of the shortage of drugs has also prompted some families who have not been infected to start stocking up on additional drugs in advance.
In parts of the United States, sales of drugs related to coughs, colds, flu and nasal congestion have directly doubled in the past month.
In some areas where drug supply is limited, sales have also been pushed up by 30%.
In addition, from a supply point of view, the tight supply chain of production is also a factor that causes a "short-term drug shortage".
According to a recent study, 84% of the global supply of Acetaminophen (the main component of Tylenol) comes from China and India, with China accounting for nearly two-thirds of the total supply; Ipuprofen also comes from China, accounting for one-third of global production.
Meanwhile, Johnson & Johnson, the parent company of Technol and Merrill Lynch, has pharmaceutical plants in cities such as Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou in China.
The capacity of these factories has been limited by China ’ s previous strict epidemic prevention policies.
Even though the control has been almost liberalized recently, the continuous positive performance of workers has also affected factory capacity to a certain extent.
In addition, transportation problems can also lead to drug shortages, and international shipping has not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels.
But despite this, some pharmaceutical companies say that there is no problem with the supply of drugs, there is sufficient stock, but it only takes time to get to the major supermarkets and pharmacies.
When people make decisions, they are more or less unavoidably influenced by their surroundings.
The same is true in the case of drugs.
The recently criticized and controversial supermarket drug purchase behavior is actually the product driven by profit under the "drug demand" and "panic stocking".
Of course, it is not difficult to predict that with the change of time, the flu season slowly ends and the recovery of supply capacity, everything will gradually be on track.
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In Europe, countries like Spain and Germany faced critical shortages of antibiotics and pediatric medications due to increased demand from respiratory infections and weakened immunity post-COVID-19, compounded by inflation and high energy costs.

Title:

Content: There is not enough medicine in the EU
19 January 2023, 05: 20
ASTANA.
KAZINFORM - The European Union is suffering from a shortage of medicines.
Deficiency of antibiotics, such as amoxicillin, drugs against colds, flu and other respiratory infections, as well as some drugs for children, reports MIA "Kazinform" with reference to euronews.com.
In most countries, the situation is considered critical, but since such goods from pharmacies do not disappear at all, citizens are not advised to make stocks.
Doctors note a weakening in the population of natural immunity due to protection against coronavirus such as social distancing.
The main reasons for the sharp increase in demand, which have been identified, is the high prevalence of respiratory diseases with a lack of production capacity.
As pharmaceutical issues are being addressed at the national level, Governments are already taking steps to overcome the shortage
These measures include the sale of generics and the replacement of requested medicines with similar ones.
In some countries, some formulations have been changed, for example, drugs are offered in the form of syrups instead of tablets, so that children are more willing to take them.
"Pediatric drugs are generally now less available in the form of conventional tablets," said Steffen Tierstrup, chief medical officer of the European Medicines Agency. "Therefore, where children are more ill, the need for pediatric drugs is higher than for adult drugs."
A recent study showed that the shortage of drugs in Spain increased by 38% over the year.
The decline in their production was affected by inflation, high energy prices, shortages of raw materials and the effects of the pandemic.
“We need diversification, ” said Ilaria Passarani, head of the EU Pharmaceutical Group.“ Of course, it would be useful to return to Europe the production of some critical materials, such as active ingredients.
But we can't return all the production of all the materials we use for drugs.
This entails problems such as the increase in pharmacy prices associated with the implementation of environmental laws, labor laws, which are not necessarily enforced in other regions. ”
In March, the European Commission will present a revised version of the EU pharmaceutical legislation, which will include stricter supply obligations, earlier notification of shortages and seizures of medicines, and better informing the public about available stocks.
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In Germany, shortages of fever syrups and blood pressure drugs were attributed to cost pressures driving production to Asia, where shipping delays further disrupted domestic supply, forcing pharmacies to find substitutes or produce alternatives at higher costs.

Title:

Content: Sunday 20th November 2022 Abu Dhabi UAE
Prayer times
News Highlights
Today 's Issue
Today 's Issue
Arabic & International
Pharmacies in Germany complain of shortage of medicines
Pharmacies in Germany complain of shortage of medicines
November 19, 2022 13: 20
Pharmacies in Germany complain of a constant shortage of supplies of a number of medicines, such as fever syrup medicines for children, stomach acid blockers, cough medicines and blood pressure medicines.
Thomas Price, head of the pharmacists' union in the North Rhine region of Düsseldorf, said problems had increased in the past few months, adding: "The situation is bad."
Looking ahead to 2023, Price said: “We expect the supply deficit to increase. ”
A spokesman for the German Federation of Pharmacists' Trade Unions said there was a "significant challenge" facing the sector in light of the supply deficit, which is expected to continue for the foreseeable future.
The union justified the tense situation with "enormous cost pressures in the healthcare system".
To save money, manufacturers rely on production in Asia, the spokesman said, explaining that when a shipment is disrupted there or shipping delays occur, it has consequences for domestic supply.
Frequent drug supply bottlenecks in Germany are a nuisance for pharmacies, because they have to find drug substitutes for patients or sometimes have to produce them themselves, but this process is expensive and not every pharmacy can handle it.
The Federal Institute of Medicines and Medical Products (BIMP) has received about 300 notifications of supply bottlenecks in relation to about 100,000 approved medicines in Germany.
However, there are alternatives to many drugs that are not available.
Supply bottlenecks do not necessarily mean a shortage of supplies, the institute said, adding that so far there have been only about 10 notifications of acute shortages of active substances.
The institute said it currently saw "no signs of a general sharp deterioration in the supply situation in Germany".
Source: DBA
All rights reserved to Al Ittihad Newspaper 2022 ©

Healthcare systems worldwide implemented various strategies to cope with shortages, including rationing care, switching to alternative drugs, and adjusting treatment plans, as evidenced by a survey where 99% of U.S. hospital pharmacists reported shortages.

In response to chemotherapy drug shortages, hospitals prioritized completing treatment regimens for existing patients while altering protocols for new patients, such as switching medications or adjusting dosing schedules.

Title:

Content: How the Chemotherapy Shortage Is Affecting Frontline Clinicians

— "How are we here in 2023 having some of these discussions?" bemoans gynecologic cancer expert

MedpageToday
  • Emily Hutto is an Associate Video Producer & Editor for MedPage Today. She is based in Manhattan.

In this exclusive Instagram Live clip, Jeremy Faust, MD, editor-in-chief of MedPage Today, and Eleonora Teplinsky, MD, head of Breast and Gynecologic Medical Oncology for Valley-Mount Sinai Comprehensive Cancer Center in Paramus, New Jersey, discuss how the recent shortage of the chemotherapy mainstays cisplatin and carboplatin have impacted cancer patients and frontline clinicians.

The following is a transcript of their remarks:

Faust: Dr. Teplinsky, let me ask you about your side as a frontline clinician in this area. As an ER doctor, I don't type in, "Let's give a patient cisplatin." That's not an order that I put in. So, how long have you been seeing shortages like this that affect your patients?

Teplinsky: I would say around April -- again, talking about this particular shortage with carboplatin and cisplatin -- I think around April we started hearing about it. But it was one of those things, I'll be honest, where you're like, "Oh, this can't possibly happen. This is happening somewhere else. This isn't affecting us."

Then I think NBC ran an article on it. Then for a month nothing happened, and then all of a sudden, I would say in May, it really kind of exploded in the sense that many, [the] majority of cancer centers were either experiencing complete absence of drugs or shortage of drugs. They weren't able to procure it from their suppliers.

That quickly made its way to the patients not being able to get the drug, or having to sit in front of a patient and say, "I have a treatment for you. I don't know if you'll get it. I don't know when you'll get it. I don't know what dose I can give you."

And imagine, you're already facing this life-changing diagnosis, but there are drugs -- you just don't know when you'll get them. I think that we don't talk enough about that emotional toll that takes on patients, because the uncertainty that everyone was facing was really quite tragic.

Faust: When you had that conversation with a patient -- I guess it depends on the kind of cancer, doesn't it? Because there are certain oncologic conditions where we're so fortunate that we have many, many regimens. Maybe this one is a tiny bit better than that one and you're sort of scraping out on your Kaplan-Meier curves, your survival curves, a couple of months here. Are you able to reassure your patients, or does it really depend on the kind of cancer that we're talking about?

Teplinsky: It really depends on the kind of cancer.

I will say that the Society of Gynecologic Oncology really led the way with this because, unlike in other cancers where you can substitute, in gynecologic cancers it's really hard -- you need the platinum drugs. So they led the way. And then ASCO, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, followed and came up with guidelines for clinicians about when you can substitute, what you could substitute. Can we spread out the dosing, so instead of every 3 weeks, can we give it every 4 weeks to make the drug last longer? Can you reduce the dose?

Conversations that, again -- how are we here in 2023 and having some of these discussions? But that's kind of what happened.

The challenge really was: do we have data to substitute? Will you sacrifice the efficacy if you switch from one drug to another? Then as a result, if now everyone is shifting to this drug, do we have supply for the other drugs? So I think [they really were] very difficult discussions. And again, for some disease types we were able to make that switch, but not for all.

Faust: OK. I want to jump over in just a second to some of the policy side, but let me stick with you for one moment just to pursue that point a little further.

I study outcomes, mostly with COVID, but lots of other things too. But when you're making these switches, I know that in pediatric oncology, for example, they're always tweaking and testing and saying, "Let's compare A to B and see how they do." As this is happening, is this just too chaotic for anyone to stop and say, "Well, actually this is a little bit of an unfortunate opportunity to see well, are these biosimilars actually behaving decently comparably?" Or is it just too random for anything to be learned from this?

Teplinsky: Yeah, I think that it would've been great to be able to study, but it was too erratic because everyone was at different points in their treatment cycles. Some people had gotten five cycles and they had one more left. Other people were just starting out. Some of those patients we had to pivot and not do chemotherapy first, for example, and do surgery first where we normally wouldn't. So the circumstances and the situations were each too different to actually look at this in a cohesive way.

I do think that, fortunately, people moved fairly quickly to try to get drugs and try to increase supply. So we were in this bad point for a couple weeks, but it started to recover, but now we're seeing a different shortage of 5-fluorouracil.

I am curious about this from the policy side, but unless we really come up with long-term solutions, the short-term solutions are going to just lead us to another drug shortage in 3 more months for something else.

Faust: You mentioned the word "allocation" and that set off a thought that I wanted to talk about on the clinical side. So Dr. Teplinsky, we know that drugs don't reach every community equally, right? There are certainly "haves" and "have-nots" and the in-between. From the standpoint of oncology, do we sense that when shortages happen, there's a disparity in terms of who's affected?

Teplinsky: Absolutely. I mean, I think we have to keep in mind that the majority of patients are still treated in the community setting.

For this particular shortage, NCCN, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network, did a study of multiple NCCN sites and they found that about 93% were affected by the shortage in some way. What we don't have information on, again, is in terms of exactly which settings were more affected than others.

Understandably, patients, if they are treated in a community site that maybe is not a big center -- that's a small site that purchases a very small amount and didn't stockpile -- those people are going to be predominantly affected. And very often they cannot travel to a bigger site that has more resources if they're in a setting where this is the only site or they are limited by socioeconomic disparities.

Absolutely, this heightens the already ongoing disparities that we see in cancer treatment. Absolutely.

Faust: In terms of how that plays out for your patient population or your colleagues, does this lead to your job being a lot of case management, in a sense? You know the medicine, you know the drugs, but what you need to figure out is who has what and who can go where. Is that really where a lot of resources and your time get spent in your office?

Teplinsky: I mean, that's part of it.

I think the challenge too is that, a couple months ago, no one knew when more drugs would arrive. So a lot of places were also sharing with each other, but they were also hesitant about taking on new patients, right? Because if we can't even provide for our existing patients, what's that going to look like?

But I think the other piece that really is challenging is, if you do have a limited supply, who do you prioritize it to? This was something we saw in COVID also in terms of access to care when the pandemic was at its height. The same thing now: do you give [the drugs] to the person that is going to be cured, hopefully, with this, or someone who needs it for a palliative reason? But how do you make that distinction?

I think those are really challenging questions and really hard decisions for physicians to have to make.

Faust: What do you tell a friend -- not a patient, because a patient's coming to you and you're going to treat them -- if someone says, "Look, I got a biopsy and they're sending me to this oncology center or that one," would you tell them to look into this? You don't want to go down a pathway with a wonderful practice who actually can't treat you, when across the street for reasons that we just discussed a minute ago -- some negotiation or someone got it ahead of a stampede in a panic -- they have the drug.

Would you advise patients who are looking at this landscape to behave any differently than they would've in another environment?

Teplinsky: Absolutely. I mean, I'm a firm believer that patients have to be their best advocate and you have to be your own advocate. I think it's a very appropriate question to say when you're meeting a practice, "I know that my regimen is recommended to have carboplatin," for example, "Can you talk about where your institution or cancer center or hospital is with regards to these shortages?" I think that those are very valid questions.

Part of the things that we say: what should you ask your oncologist? I think in this space and time that we're in, that should be part of the list. Because again, like you said, you don't want to all be set up for treatment to find out that they don't actually have the drug.

I think the challenge is in patients who are not able to do that, who are not able to go somewhere else, and that's really hard.

Faust: Yeah. It's interesting to me, again, I'm an ER doctor, but I work in a pretty fancy magnet hospital. People always come to us for second opinions or for the magic stuff that Dana-Farber [Cancer Institute] might have, as if it's any different.

In some cases, look, we have wonderful experts and we have some experimental treatments that are unavailable everywhere else. But a lot of times when it's straightforward, I kind of feel like we've got a nation of really, really qualified oncologists. You don't need to fly halfway across the country to get first-line treatment. And yet, some people actually would do that. They want that name brand.

But now you could argue that the big-name brands are probably the ones that have the most purchasing power and bargaining power, so all of a sudden it might matter, right?

Teplinsky: Yeah, I think we don't know. And it varies. I mean, some of the biggest cancer centers were actually the ones experiencing some of the bigger shortages.

Faust: Oh, really?

Teplinsky: It was very variable throughout the country, but you could see on Twitter, people were sharing, "Who's got the drug? Who doesn't have the drug?" So it really was very surprising, actually, that this hospital had it, this cancer center didn't, and vice versa.

It's also such a fluctuating state, right? You might have it tomorrow, you might not have it the next week, which is why I think this was so hard for patients because there was no guarantee of when it would come back. I think that really exacerbated all of it as well.

The European Commission proposed measures such as a voluntary solidarity mechanism, joint procurement, and extending drug shelf life to address shortages, while encouraging domestic production to mitigate future crises.

In Taiwan, the Ministry of Health and Welfare established a centralized drug shortage treatment center and optimized supply chain communication to ensure stable availability of essential medications.

Title:

Content: The lack of medicine continues to burn!
The Ministry of Health and Welfare has proposed a short, medium and long-term strategy to deal with the current 5 coping mechanisms.
Journalist Yen Zhenzhen / Taipei Report
According to the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the shortage of drugs is not a single factor, but includes supply problems, manufacturing problems, clinical demand factors, uneven distribution of drugs, drug use habits and drug prices. In addition to dealing with the relatively high clinical demand items, it is properly allocated to all levels of medical institutions and pharmacies to fully meet the needs of clinical end-use drugs.
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In the face of the shortage of drugs, Wang said, the existing health insurance uses five major coping mechanisms, including 1, a single processing window, a dedicated person to help deal with the problem of drug purchase, and contact the Food and Drug Administration to put relevant information on the website of the NHI. (4) Drug price adjustment mechanism that does not meet the cost can be re-checked according to the way of raising the price of special drugs; (5) Alternative drugs can still declare the cost, if they are not irreplaceable, they can be replaced at the same price or lower than the original prescription drug price.
In addition, Wang pointed out that in the face of the international epidemic, the Russian-Ukrainian war, and labor shortage, drug shortage is a problem facing all countries. In order to strengthen the stable supply mechanism of drugs in China, the Ministry of Health and Welfare continues to actively respond to the short-term strategy to solve the problem of drug shortage. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the pharmaceutical industry have made every effort to actively arrange production lines, strive for early import, increase production / import quantity, and properly distribute to all levels of medical institutions and pharmacies to fully meet the demand for clinical end use drugs.
In addition, to properly handle the issue of drug price adjustment, the Central Health Insurance Administration of the Ministry of Health and Welfare intends to implement the "Universal Health Insurance Cost Distribution Target System (DET)" in April this year, which will adjust the number of drug prices and adjust the quota in a suitable manner, taking into account factors such as the epidemic, the Russian-Ukrainian war and inflation.
In terms of medium-term strategy, Wang said that he will establish a permanent drug shortage treatment center and optimize drug supply information transmission.
In order to speed up the handling of drug shortage incidents, we will adopt dedicated personnel and cross-departmental cooperation to develop drug shortage prevention policies to prevent drug shortage in advance, strengthen cross-departmental data integration and proactive monitoring to detect drug shortage incidents at an early stage, and intervene early through cross-departmental cooperation to stabilize drug supply.
At the same time, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) continues to disseminate drug supply and alternative drug information through various channels. In addition to posting on the “Drug Supply Information Platform ”, the FDA will notify medical institutions and pharmacies through VPN, and weekly letters to relevant medical associations and public associations to inform members. Management system.
In the long-term strategy section, it includes reviewing the current health insurance drug pricing policy and encouraging the production of domestically manufactured generic drugs.
Wang Bi-sheng pointed out that in the review of the current health insurance drug price policy, including the development of the price protection of indicative drugs, drug price review for the lack of drugs; start the review of drug expenditure target (DET), plan the establishment of a risk control mechanism, plan the national unified procurement trial plan; comprehensively review the health insurance drug price policy, give an appropriate price protection mechanism for necessary drugs, and also target the patent period. To encourage the production of domestic manufacturers to ensure that when there is a shortage of original pharmaceutical products, there are domestic famous drugs to respond.
Wang also stressed that the Food and Drug Administration has set up a "Drug Supply Information Platform" (https: / / dsms.fda.gov.tw /), reporting hotline (02) 27878249. If medical institutions and pharmacies have any shortage of drugs, they can go to the platform for enquiry or notification, and the department will deal with it immediately.
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In rural China, the government prioritized drug distribution to underserved areas by coordinating daily dispatch systems, expanding production capacity, and promoting the use of traditional Chinese medicine to alleviate shortages.

Title:

Content: Health · Life
How to solve the problem of drug shortage in rural areas?
National Health Commission response
January 07, 2023 17: 26 Source: People 's Daily Online
Beijing, January 7 (Reporter Yan Yan Yan) Today, the joint prevention and control mechanism of the State Council held a press conference to introduce the situation of epidemic prevention and control in rural areas and answer questions from the media.
At the press conference, a reporter asked, recently, many township health centers and village health rooms have a shortage of drugs and other problems, how to properly solve?
Nie Chunlei, director of the grass-roots department of the National Health Commission, said that rural areas are the focus of epidemic prevention and control and are also weak links.
The joint prevention and control mechanism of the State Council has attached great importance to the prevention and control of the epidemic in rural areas and made a lot of arrangements for deployment.
There is a shortage of medicines and other medical supplies in rural areas, for three reasons: First, the production capacity of individual medicines is insufficient, and the supply is in short supply.
Second, the information between the supply and demand sides is not smooth.
Third, logistics reasons, some purchased drugs can not be delivered in time, resulting in a shortage of drugs.
In response to the shortage of drugs, the state has taken a series of measures, Nie Chunlei said. First, the material support group of the joint prevention and control mechanism of the State Council has established a daily dispatch system to coordinate the daily dispatch of drugs and other key medical supplies.
According to the development of the epidemic, priority is given to medical institutions in rural areas, especially in rural areas.
For some drugs that are in short supply, those with insufficient production capacity, actively coordinate and expand production capacity.
Relevant departments have formulated policies to support relevant enterprises to expand production capacity, mobilize the enthusiasm of enterprises, and work overtime to produce relevant drugs.
The second is to strengthen supply and demand docking.
Rural areas have a wide range of points and long supply chains, and if the docking of supply and demand is not smooth, the problems reflected by the grassroots may not be timely feedback.
Local governments are encouraged to focus on procurement.
All localities should strengthen the docking of supply and demand through material support groups to solve the shortage of medicines in a timely manner.
Third, adhere to the combination of Chinese and Western medicine, rational selection of Western medicine, Chinese patent medicine and traditional Chinese medicine decoction.
Local governments, especially in rural areas, should be encouraged to give full play to the characteristics of rural areas, make full use of traditional Chinese medicines, alleviate the problem of insufficient medicines, and reduce the pressure on grass-roots medical care
Nie Chunlei said: "From the current monitoring situation, the shortage of medical supplies is more prominent, but recently with the development of the epidemic and the growth of drug production capacity in various localities, the coordination of material support groups and logistics is smooth, and the local government Strengthen the organization, the problem of drug shortage is gradually improving.
(Editor: Yang Di, Gao Lei)
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The U.S. government proposed allocating $3.26 billion to $5.11 billion over the next decade to address supply chain fragmentation and incentivize manufacturers to produce generic drugs, alongside recommendations for increased FDA authority to enhance transparency.

Pharmaceutical companies increasingly relied on predictive analytics and AI-driven tools to address supply chain disruptions, enabling real-time adjustments to forecasts and operations based on fluid market conditions.

Title:

Content: Analytics and AI in 2022: Innovation in the era of COVID

This year's predictions focus less on analytics technology per se and more on its application to address pandemic-driven phenomena.

As we have reached the end of 2021, my inbox has become stuffed with the now customary batch of emails, from tech companies and their PR agencies, sharing management's thoughts on what next year will hold for us, in the world of data, analytics and AI. As ever, the annual exercise of compiling sage predictions about the upcoming year, from executives around the industry, was a big effort. In fact, once all the prediction emails were consolidated, a 50-page document resulted. As with any big data exercise, my goal was to aggregate the data into groupings I could organize it by, both to tame the volume of the data and because the groupings are themselves instructive.

This year, most of the predictions were not about particular technologies, like Hadoop, Kafka or Spark. And they weren't even about tech genre issues like the battle between data warehouses and data lakes. Instead, this year's predictions (for next year) focused on broader business or even societal issues, many of which stem from the world's collective experience of the Coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic and the changes it has imposed.

Technology's in there, of course; for example, there was a lot of discussion of artificial intelligence (AI), low code/no code platforms and architectural approaches to analytics, like Data Fabric and Data Mesh. But issues pertaining to supply chain disruptions; labor shortages and the "great resignation;" and the interplay between customer experience management, personalization and data protection had huge presence as well.

Let's explore a grouped summary of the predictions.

Supply Chain

We all know the pandemic has had a knock-on effect of impacting global supply chains. For business, that has meant disruption and flux. Interestingly, many of our prediction participants saw this as a tech challenge. As unpredictable as supply chain issues might make things feel, many predictions were based on the premise that predictive analytics could mitigate the the difficulties, as long as the models themselves were carefully monitored for accuracy and drift.

"Many industrial companies...over the last two years...were forced to rely on AI and other digital technologies to solve urgent, real-world problems in supply chains and production" said Artem Kroupenev, VP of Strategy at Augury. Nick Elprin, CEO, Domino Data Lab, feels "the continued volatility of unpredictable business factors, from supply chains to extreme weather, will greatly accelerate the need for businesses to continuously monitor how well their models reflect the real and rapidly changing world of their customers."

Alok Ajmera, CEO of Prophix, opines "Businesses have seen their share of disruptions over the last year, and in 2022 they most likely will continue to deal with the impact of supply chain shortages, rising inflation, and increased cyber security threats...Cloud-based "if/then" scenario planning software tools [enable]...continuously reset forecasts...according to real time data insights to meet fluid market conditions."

Beware, though. Supply chain issues don't just impact material goods; they can impact the technology we tend to view as infinite and always available, too. With that in mind, Lenley Hensarling, chief strategy officer at Aerospike, said "Supply chain issues, both hardware and personnel, will continue with the cloud..as companies continue to migrate to the cloud in 2022, they'll be surprised to find hardware and personnel shortages that may force them to alter their plans."

You can't fire me, I quit

And speaking of the personnel shortages, many of our predictors had something to say about "the great resignation," 2021's apparent voluntary exodus of workers from their jobs. For example, Buno Pati, CEO of Infoworks says that we should "consider [the great resignation's] particular implications regarding scarce data engineering and data science talent, already in very high demand and commanding significant compensation." In other words, finding good data pros was bad before, and it's getting even worse. As to a solution, he predicts that "in the coming year, adoption of new automated approaches to data operations and orchestration will free this critical talent pool from the mundane and focus these valuable professionals on creating and delivering business value."

Momentive (formerly SurveyMonkey) CIO, Eric Johnson, agrees that automation can help address the shortage and work as a retention tool to keep existing employees happier: "in 2020, 31% of companies had at least one system automated. With the great resignation and demand for better quality jobs, automation will accelerate immensely to remove monotonous processes and ensure employees have high-quality work experiences with diverse and meaningful tasks." Speaking to that notion of quality, Johnson also says "The Great Resignation has shown that pay is no longer a main retention lever. Employees are instead eager to have the working environment they want and new challenges that keep them improving and learning as individuals and professionals."

There's an AI angle here too. Nick Curcuru, Vice President of Advisory Services at Privitar, says "analytics in HR has traditionally been about reporting. As organizations grapple with employee turnover amidst the 'Great Resignation,' they will increasingly look to predictive analytics to help save the day." Gleb Polyakov, co-founder and CEO of Nylas, says "Advancements in AI combined with the labor shortage and demand for rapid scale have forced companies to automate wherever possible." Polyakov doesn't predict a dystopian situation though, assuring us that "...even with continued AI-led innovation, humans will continue playing an essential role in true organizational impact, analysis, and growth."

Of fabric, and mesh

Beyond societal issues, architectural ones have been important this year too, especially those that can help companies leverage their analytics investments more successfully. Leading contenders here are the Data Mesh and Data Fabric approaches and many of this year's predictions focused on them.

To begin with, Steve Totman, Chief Strategy Officer at Privitar, believes that "Organizations are increasingly embracing data mesh and data fabric methodologies as the basis of their modern data stacks." Infoworks' Pati is right there with him and thinks that "2022 will see significant growth and interest in data fabric solutions as companies seek to leverage a common management layer to accelerate analytics migration to the cloud, ensure security and governance, quickly [and] deliver business value..." On behalf of the company, he states "we believe this technology will be broadly adopted over the next five years."

Totman and Pati are not alone. "'Data fabric' will be a popular buzzword." was one of five big predictions from Mark Van de Wiel, VP of Technology at HVR (now owned by Fivetran). And Ravi Shankar, SVP and CMO at Denodo, headlines his #1 predicted trend as "Data fabric becomes the foundation for the distributed enterprise," adding that "by enabling organizations to choose their preferred tools, these data fabrics will reduce time-to-delivery and make it a preferred data management approach in the coming year."

Haoyuan Li, founder and CEO of Alluxio, sees Data Fabric as more than popular...he views it as a solution to the new round of data silos: "with SaaS and managed services in the cloud creating data silos, improved governance and catalog with a data fabric spanning multiple services will come to the rescue in 2022." Komprise president Krishna Subramanian sees a similar silo-busting value proposition, stating that "IT and storage managers will choose data fabric architectures to unlock data from storage and enable data-centric vs storage centric management."

Sure seems there's a lot of hope riding on these architectures. I wonder what next year's experts will say about that.

No/Lo-Co

We've already mentioned automation as a partial antidote to the labor shortage, and many of our predicting personnel see low-code/no-code platforms -- in many ways, automation's partner -- as a huge force for efficiency and change in 2022.

Christine Spang, co-founder and CTO of Nylas, predicts, given the "Engineering Labor Shortage, Low-Code Development Takes Off," and expounds on that headline by saying "we'll see the adoption of low-code, no-code tools and applications accelerate in 2022 and beyond."

Venkat Thiruvengadam, the founder and CEO of DuploCloud, explains: "no-code/low code platforms enable non-technical business experts to create software in the domains they know best, without requiring coding knowledge. Experts who were previously locked out of a business idea because they lacked the coding expertise can now get started with minimal coding knowledge." He adds that "the DevOps skills shortage will only continue to grow, accelerating the need for no-code / low code solutions."

But Gil Hoffer, Co-Founder and CTO of Salto, addresses the flip side of that DevOps observation, believing that no- and low-code will acquire attributes of conventional software: "as no code and low code platforms and tools become more pervasive, methodologies and tools from the software development and DevOps worlds, such as automation, version control and declarative languages will be applied and added to these environments."

DevOps-hungry or not, Mendix CEO Tim Srock and his team think "low-code will move past app development" and feel it will grow to "include customer experience design and intelligent workflow automation." The Mendix gang also feels that "...companies will use low-code to automate tasks within workflows." And Ryan Welsh, Founder and CEO of Kyndi, thinks low- and no-code will move into the AI realm too, predicting that "Universal AI will be embedded in a suite of configurable business solutions that do not require coding."

But how long can low/no...go? Since the advent of CASE (computer-aided software engineering) in the 1980s, we've seen platforms that require minimal programming have huge appeal. We've also seen the pendulum swing back the other way, where code-first platforms, and the skill sets needed to drive them, migrate back into high demand.

Personalized, but not surveilled

From low-code, we move to what we might call "low-data." Dr. Jans Aasman, CEO of Franz Inc., characterized the new normal of personal data analytics: "in 2022 we will see new ways for users to regain control of their data." That's great, but it's yet another disruption, forcing companies to personalize experiences without access to as much personal data. Jennifer Krizanek, President, NA and CMO of Contentserv, describes the challenge: "2022 will witness businesses strategizing on how to personalize the customer experience without breaking GDPR laws or infringing on consumers' data privacy rights." She further opines that next year "will be the year in which businesses learn how to operate, market and personalize their offerings to consumers without tracking their every move."

But how can that be done? For openers, Denodo's Shankar says that "in 2022, organizations will leverage small data analytics to create hyper personalized experiences for their individual customers to understand customer sentiment around a specific product or service within a short time window." That makes sense, but the requirement still seems formidable.

AI, as it turns out, may be the key to doing more with less. "With machine learning, companies can optimize, automate, and personalize content and message delivery timing to increase engagement rates at the personal level" says Jason VandeBoom, CEO of ActiveCampaign. And that's not just a nice-to-have according to Mendix folks. Rather they see it as a must-have: "Hyper-personalization will become the norm: As the world becomes increasingly digital, customers will expect experiences that are tailored and can adapt to their needs and desires in the moment. To do that, applications need to take advantage of AI versus executing simple rules."

Vertical AI

AI isn't just for personalization though. In fact, the sense of the predictors' room is that vertical industries, from finance to healthcare, will benefit from AI in 2002. Ajmera at Prophix headlines one of his predictions as: "The Era of AI-Powered Corporate Finance Is Here." His analysis says "...as businesses emerge from the volatile pandemic period, expect to see CFOs finally taking the plunge into AI-powered finance technologies, kickstarting the next era of super-charged corporate finance." Franz's Aasman says "This 'Total AI' is swiftly becoming necessary to tackle enterprise scale applications of mission-critical processes like predicting equipment failure, optimizing healthcare treatment, and maximizing customer relationships."

Further along the healthcare road, Dave Wessinger, CEO and Co-Founder, PointClickCare, believes that "in 2022 we should expect to see more healthcare organizations capitalize on artificial intelligence (AI) to monitor patient behavior, overall creating a safer environment for patients and powering healthcare staff to provide more streamlined and better care." It's not just AI, either. Todd Gottula, President, Clarify Health, thinks analytics will come along for the ride: "Payers, providers, and life sciences companies will turn to on-demand analytics software that gives them instant access to a 360-degree view of the patient journey and a window into how medical care and social and behavioral determinants of health interconnect to influence outcomes."

Transformation can be fun

Virtually everything we've looked at so far pertains to digital transformation, even if only implicitly. But how well have such "DX" efforts gone this far? Not far enough, in the view of Contentserv's Krizanek, who "...believes in 2022, organizations will extend earlier digital transformation efforts but, in doing so, will be forced to rely on their ability to automate trusted data delivery."

To get there, AI comes to the rescue, again. Komprise's Subramanian believes "AI and machine learning in the cloud continue to deliver more capabilities for customers and are becoming core enablers of digital transformation." Subramanian believes it's less not only about AI though. Companies' jettisoning their proclivity to be data pack rats is another factor: "Zombie data or dead data will garner proper attention as enterprises aim to better segment, classify, organize, cleanse, manage and justify spending on storage, backup and DR. Data hoarding will come to an end as part of successful digital transformation initiatives."

SingleStore's Oliver Schabenberger thinks DX success is a data storage technology issue, and one that will be solved in a couple of years: "By 2024, data technology will have evolved to allow organizations to optimize for frictionless digital transformation rather than optimize for read/write of transactions or efficient scans of large datasets. Databases will be an active participant and orchestrator of decision support." Given the company's combination of row store and column store technology in one database, this vantage point makes sense.

Don't just innovate, operate

Overall, while they don't come right out and say it, our clairvoyants seem to see 2022 as a year of fit-and-finish, rather than one of raw innovation. We already have tons of great analytics and intelligence technology, and we have, for a few years now, understood their potential collective transformative power. What we have largely neglected, though, is achieving high rates of success in implementing these technologies and making them operational. With the economic and logistical impacts of the COVID pandemic, that's now moved from being suboptimal to being inexcusable.

Now we need to take stock of what we have, slow down on adding to it and ramp up on the discipline necessary to exploit it to its full potential. Our prognosticators think that will happen in 2022. My guess is it might take longer, but it's a good omen that people have apparently been pondering it so fully in the latter part of 2021.

Global initiatives, such as the WHO's Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator, aimed to mitigate shortages in developing countries by procuring antiviral drugs at low costs and increasing access to screening tools.

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Reuters: World Health Organization wants $10 per treatment to buy new crown antiviral drugs
Reuters: World Health Organization wants $10 per treatment to buy new crown antiviral drugs
Draft documents obtained by Reuters show that the World Health Organization is leading a program to ensure equitable access to COVID-19 vaccine screening tools and treatments in poor countries, with the goal of getting antiviral drugs for mild patients at a low price of $10 per course of treatment.
Merck & Co ’ s experimental oral drug, molnupiravir, could be one of them, along with other drugs being developed to treat patients with mild conditions.
The document, dated October 13, outlines the goals of the WHO ’ s Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator (ACT-A) by September 2022.
The plan aims to distribute about 1 billion screening kits to poor countries and procure enough drugs to treat 120 million patients worldwide, with the World Health Organization estimating an additional 200 million cases worldwide in the coming year.
Currently, poor countries perform an average of only 50 screenings per 100,000 people per day, compared to 750 in rich countries.
ACT-A aims to increase screening rates in poor countries to at least 100 per 100,000 people.
In the global race for vaccines, the vast majority of vaccines go to rich countries, while some of the poorest countries receive only small amounts.
The ACT-A program emphasizes that WHO is keen to increase the supply of drugs and screening tools at relatively low prices.
A spokesman for the ACT-A program said the document is only a draft under negotiation, so it will not be commented on before the decision is made.
The document will be sent to global leaders before the G20 summit in Rome at the end of this month.
The ACT-A program requires the Group of 20 and other donors to spend an additional $22.8 billion by September next year to procure and distribute vaccines, drugs and screening tools to poor countries to reduce the huge supply gap between rich and less advanced countries.
So far, $18.5 billion has been pledged for the project.
These financial requirements, based on detailed estimates of drugs, therapies, and screening tools, will account for the largest portion of the program, as will the cost of delivering vaccines.
Monapiravir is not explicitly mentioned in the document, but it is expected to pay $10 per course for “new oral antiviral drugs for mild / moderate symptoms. ”
Other drugs to treat mild conditions are still in development, but Monapilavir is the only one currently showing positive results in late-stage trials.
The ACT-A program is in talks with Merck and Genuine Pharmaceuticals about procurement.
Compared to the price that the United States agreed to purchase 1.7 million treatment sets at $700 per treatment, $10 can be extremely cheap.
However, a Harvard study shows that Monapilavir, if produced by a generic drug company, can cost about $20 per course of treatment, and may be reduced to $7.7 under optimal production.
Merck has signed licensing agreements with eight Indian pharmaceutical companies.
The ACT-A plan document mentions that the goal is to reach an agreement by the end of November to ensure the supply of “outpatient oral drugs ”, with the hope of starting in the first quarter of next year.
Screening for ACT Vaccine
The last one.
Vaccination or unemployment?
Most LAUSD faculty members choose vaccines

The World Health Organization (WHO) collaborated with industry and manufacturers to improve access to essential medicines like insulin by diversifying production, regulating prices, and strengthening local manufacturing capacities in underserved areas.

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Content: Insulin is still out of reach for many diabetics a century after it was discovered.
12 November 2021
The World Health Organization says insulin is still out of reach for many people with diabetes.
This came in a report published on Friday to mark the 100th anniversary of insulin discovery.
The report, “Fulfilling a 100-year-old promise – making insulin accessible globally, ” details the main barriers to access to life-saving drugs: rising prices, low availability of human insulin, market dominance by a few producers, and weak health systems.
Profit over solidarity.
Insulin is a “cornerstone ” for diabetes treatment, and WHO is working with countries and manufacturers to expand access to everyone who needs it.
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the UN health agency, said: “The scientists who discovered insulin 100 years ago refused to take profit for their discovery and sold the patent for just $1.
Unfortunately, this gesture of solidarity has been moved away by a multi-billion dollar business that has created significant gaps in access. ”
Diabetes is a chronic disease that occurs when the pancreas is unable to produce enough insulin, or when the body is unable to effectively use the insulin it produces.
Insulin is a hormone that controls the level of sugar in the blood.
Hyperglycemia, also known as high blood sugar, is a common result of a malfunction in blood sugar control, and over time leads to serious damage to many body systems, especially nerves and blood vessels.
WHO / T. Habjouqa
Raghad, a refugee girl living in a refugee camp in Jordan, has diabetes
Millions cannot reach.
There are two forms of diabetes.
The first type is type 2 diabetes.
This type, previously called non-insulin diabetes or prediabetes in adults, is caused by the body ’ s lack of effective use of insulin.
Most people with diabetes have type 2 diabetes.
This pattern is often caused by excessive body weight and lethargy.
The second type is type 1 diabetes.
Formerly known as insulin-dependent diabetes or diabetes that appears in adolescence or childhood, this type is characterized by a lack of insulin production and requires daily insulin intake.
The causative factors of type 1 diabetes and the means to prevent it are unknown.
Symptoms include hyperuria, thirst, persistent hunger, weight loss, blurred vision and fatigue.
These symptoms may appear suddenly.
The World Health Organization said insulin is essential for more than 60 million people living with type 2 diabetes to reduce the risk of kidney failure, blindness and amputation.
However, one in two people who need medication does not get it.
While diabetes is on the rise in low- and middle-income countries, the insulin consumption of patients in these countries has not kept pace with the increasing burden of the disease.
Although three in four people with type 2 diabetes live outside of North America and Europe, they account for less than 40 percent of insulin sales revenue.
World Health Organization
According to the World Health Organization, nearly one in five deaths from COVID-19 in the African region is related to diabetes.
Closing the Insulin Gap
The report identifies measures to improve access to insulin and related products.
Actions include boosting human insulin production and supply, and diversifying the manufacturing of bio-alternative products to create competition and lower prices.
The World Health Organization says global markets have shifted from human insulin, which can be produced at relatively low cost, to more expensive synthetic insulin, which can be up to three times as expensive.
The UN health agency called for improving affordability by regulating prices and profit through profit margins, increasing price transparency, and strengthening local manufacturing capacity in underserved areas.
Dialogue achieves results
At the same time, research and development should be focused on the needs of low- and middle-income countries, while increased access to insulin should be accompanied by prompt diagnosis along with access to affordable devices for drug injections and blood sugar monitoring.
WHO has worked with industry in this area to address some of the barriers to the availability of insulin, medicines and related technologies, through dialogues with business associations and manufacturers.
This has resulted in numerous commitments by the industry, ranging from developing a policy outline to improve access to vital insulin alternatives, to participation in the WHO pre-qualification programme for insulin, glucose meters, test strips and diagnostic tools.
WHO / Atul Loke
Over the past four decades, the prevalence of diabetes has risen faster in low- and middle-income countries.
In this photo, a nurse from a hospital in India checks a patient ’ s blood sugar level.
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In response to acute crises, WHO coordinated with partners to deliver emergency medical supplies, such as the shipment of 30 tons of essential drugs and surgical supplies to Sudan, ensuring immediate distribution to health facilities affected by conflict-related disruptions.

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Content: Saturday 6 May 2023 Abu Dhabi UAE
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UAE, WHO send urgent medical supplies to Sudan
Emergency medical supplies shipped to Sudan
May 5, 2023 22: 23
The UAE, in cooperation with the World Health Organization (WHO), on Friday sent 30 tons of urgent medical supplies to Sudan, where a plane loaded with medical supplies to treat injuries, emergency surgeries and essential drugs arrived at Port Sudan airport.
The shipment, valued at $444,000, is the first delivered by WHO to Sudan by air since the conflict began.
The organization distributed supplies to health facilities that ran out of medical supplies days after the outbreak of the conflict in view of the large numbers of wounded.
The dispatch of the aircraft is part of the UAE ’ s ongoing relief efforts to support the Sudanese people and reflects the depth of its relations with Sudan, especially in light of the current situation.
This relief is an extension of the UAE ’ s humanitarian vision and a reflection of its relations with other countries based on bonds of human fraternity and commitment to help others during crises and emergencies.
Her Excellency Reem bint Ibrahim Al Hashimi, Minister of State for International Cooperation, said that the UAE continues to work closely with the World Health Organization (WHO) to ensure the success of the important logistical operation to send urgent medical and food supplies to help address the current crisis in Sudan.
In parallel with the calls for all parties to the current conflict to immediately cease hostilities and de-escalate a situation that is causing untold suffering to the Sudanese people, the UAE is steadfast in its commitment to provide aid and assistance to countries in times of need.
“The UAE is particularly focused on providing support to the most vulnerable people affected by the situation in Sudan, namely the sick, children, the elderly and women, who are most at risk from the ongoing and extremely worrying conflict, and these relief flights will address the most urgent gaps in the provision of medical and food services. ”
Al Hashimi stressed that the UAE ’ s steadfast humanitarian values make it imperative to continue communicating with the world with unrelenting sincerity to promote peace, security, security and stability, not only at the regional level but also around the world.
Together with its partners and the international community, the UAE continues to assist the Sudanese people in times of crisis.
Dr Michael Ryan, Executive Director of the WHO Health Emergency Programme, said: “Early this morning, a flight carrying 30 metric tonnes of health supplies worth US $444,000 left the WHO Global Logistics Centre in the UAE en route to Port Sudan in response to the current crisis in Sudan.
Health supplies include enough to treat injuries, cover emergency surgical supplies, and essential medicines to treat 165,000 people most in need of humanitarian assistance after health facilities across the country declared they had run out of basic health supplies and national medical stores were no longer available due to the security situation.
WHO has sent two emergency logistics on board to ensure these supplies are immediately distributed to 13 key health facilities to support healthcare workers and provide care to those in need.
“WHO has another 30 tonnes of supplies to fight malaria and non-communicable diseases such as diabetes and high blood pressure, conditions that can become fatal if left untreated.
These supplies and about 23,000 bags of blood are being processed within the WHO Global Logistics Centre in the International Humanitarian City in Dubai, and WHO is currently exploring all possible ways to deliver these supplies to Sudan as soon as possible in collaboration with the Sudanese Ministry of Health. ”
He pointed out that the WHO Global Logistics Centre in the UAE has become the focus of rapid supply response to acute events globally with the support of more than 140 countries in all six WHO geographical regions.
He explained that the center is a lifeline for Member States suffering from health emergencies caused by outbreaks of diseases, disasters such as floods, earthquakes and the impact of conflicts on health systems, and that the support provided by the UAE enables WHO to be at the forefront of health emergency responses and provide specialized medical assistance to those in need wherever and whenever needed.
“As part of efforts to strengthen the global health emergency preparedness, response and resilience architecture, the UAE and WHO are working together to deliver supplies to reach the world ’ s most vulnerable at a time when they are most needed. ”
Dr. Ahmed Al-Mandhari, WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean, said that WHO continues to coordinate with the Sudanese health authorities to deliver essential health supplies through all available routes, explaining that due to the conflict, hospitals, pharmacies and healthcare facilities have run out of essential life-saving medicines.
The arrival of an additional 30 tonnes of surgical and emergency supplies, in addition to essential medicines, will enable WHO to support 13 major health facilities and restore health care services to those in need.
Dr Al Mandhari said: “Our global logistics hub in Dubai plays a vital role in ensuring a continuous supply of health goods.
We are grateful for the support provided by the UAE to facilitate our first casual flight of these much-needed supplies.
Such support underscores our regional vision of health for all and for all. ”
It is worth mentioning that medical assistance provided by the World Health Organization (WHO) through the UAE amounted to about 55% of the total medical supplies provided to Sudan from abroad during 2022, which reflects the UAE ’ s position as a major center for humanitarian response and support globally.
Source: WAM
All rights reserved to Al Ittihad Newspaper 2023 ©

The Tupaia platform, used in Pacific Island countries, aggregated real-time data from health facilities to track medical supplies and facilitate redistribution during shortages, preventing disruptions in patient care.

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Content: Asia-Pacific, Environment, Headlines, Poverty & SDGs

Poverty & SDGs

Data Platform Helps Pacific Island Countries Collect, Analyse and Act on Information

KATHMANDU, Aug 31 2021 (IPS) - Do you know if midwife services are available at the Saupia Health Centre in Paunangisu, on the island of Efate in Vanuatu, in the Pacific Islands? I do, and I’ve never been within 1,000 kilometres of the facility — I found the information online within seconds thanks to a data platform called Tupaia.

Developed in 2017 as a system for tracking items on the extremely lengthy supply chains of health materials in the Pacific Islands, today Tupaia is aggregating data about health, education and the environment from a number of unrelated sources, analysing it, and presenting it in an interactive online map.

“You can look at the national level and see how many people have accessed health services within a specified time frame or you can zoom into a province or a district and see more specifically details about where there are maybe gaps to people accessing the health system, or where people are doing really well, and that allows a country to set up different responses”

“If you want to see how many people a country has had in respect to a Covid outbreak, or a dengue outbreak, that sort of information will be displayed in Tupaia,” says Erin Nunan, director of Beyond Essential Services, the company that created the platform.

“You can look at the national level and see how many people have accessed health services within a specified time frame or you can zoom into a province or a district and see more specifically details about where there are maybe gaps to people accessing the health system, or where people are doing really well, and that allows a country to set up different responses,” adds Nunan in a video interview ahead of the Small Islands States (SIDS) Solutions Forum taking place online and in person 30-31 August 2021.

Tupaia is one of the innovations being featured at the event, which aims to kickstart SIDS’ efforts to reach the global development goals by 2030. Organised by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation in partnership with the UN International Telecommunications Union and co-hosted by the Government of Fiji, the forum gathers representatives of the 38 SIDS worldwide, UN agencies and civil society.

The economies of many SIDS have been battered by COVID-19 restrictions, which have smothered the key tourist trade. Many were also already struggling with monumental challenges like rising sea levels and growing numbers of extreme weather events as a result of climate change. The forum, which ends Tuesday, is meant to “incubate, promote and scale-up home-grown and imported solutions to accelerate the achievement of the agriculture, food and nutrition related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” says the website.

The makers of Tupaia believe that the platform has moved countries closer to the targets for SDG3 (health and well-being), SDG6 (water and sanitation for all) and SDG 17 (strengthen implementation and partnership for sustainable development). Their company, Beyond Essential Systems, has also released Tamanu, a medical records system.

Today, Tupaia operates in six Pacific Island countries, and beyond, collecting data in real time from nearly 800 facilities using a variety of sources including its own app, MediTrak, and creating visualizations that health systems, workers and even patients can use for decision-making. In Fiji, it is helping to track Covid-19 swab samples.

Open source and free, thanks to funding from the Government of Australia and others, Tupaia’s data collection, management, and visualization tools can also be used to collect environmental data to manage resources such as water stations and for disaster response. In Papua New Guinea, the platform is used to track the incidence of malaria.

“It might be a nurse in a clinic, it might be an administrator in a single province, those are the people that we really consider to be the customers of the software, the actual end users,” says Michael Nunan, CEO of Beyond Essential Systems, in another video interview for the SIDS Solutions Forum.

For example, in 2018 an order for cold chain medicines for the island of Kiribati was delayed. As a result, a busy facility ran out of several items, including insulin and Hepatitis B vaccine. But the facility nurse was able to log on to Tupaia and instantly see which nearby facilities had a functioning fridge and stock of the needed medicines. She contacted one of them and was able to organise a quick delivery of stock so there was little interruption to patient care.

Named after a Polynesian navigator who joined the crew of Captain James Cook in 1769, Tupaia takes data that is often siloed in specialised software designed for specific purposes and integrates it in dashboards that are customisable for a variety of user groups.

Tupaia’s data sources, supply chain software for vaccines and other medicines, health information software, and data collection applications, deliver information about health infrastructure including cold-chain, critical medical equipment, staff, and service provision.

“Whatever it is you want to do with data, whether it’s data collection, data aggregation, analysis, visualization, or dissemination, we want you to be able to do that with Tupaia,” says Michael Nunan in the video interview.

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In Ireland, draft legislation allowed pharmacists to substitute medications during shortages and expanded their role in prescribing certain drugs, aiming to alleviate pressure on healthcare systems and address the shortage of over 350 medicines.

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Tuesday 3 October 2023 Dublin: 11°C
Leah Farrell/Rollingnews.ie Health Minister Stephen Donnelly
# Cabinet
Pharmacists to be allowed dispense some medicines, including the pill, without GP prescription
Health Minister Stephen Donnelly will bring the proposal before Cabinet this morning to help alleviate pressure on GPs.

HEALTH MINISTER STEPHEN Donnelly will this morning present Cabinet with draft legislation that would see pharmacists allowed to prescribe some medications, in a move that will help alleviate pressure on GPs.

Donnelly will today seek Cabinet approval to publish a general scheme and draft of the Health (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill.

The legislation comes as part of plans by the Minister to expand the role of pharmacists in Ireland and to make it easier for patients to access services.

The move has been supported by pharmacists for a long time, who have argued that they have the qualifications and expertise to play a more active role in dispensing medicine.

Under the new law, pharmacists will be able to supply the contraceptive pill without prescription as part of the continued roll-out of the free contraceptive scheme.

An expert taskforce has been established by Donnelly to support the expansion of pharmacy care which will look at “minor ailment schemes” and independent prescribing.

If enacted, on top of giving pharmacists the power to dispense some medicines without a GP prescription, including the contraceptive pill, the Bill aims to address the management of medicine shortages, which has become a major issue.

It would allow the Minister for Health to put in place medicines substitution protocols where a shortage of a medicinal product exists.

Recently, there have been reports of shortages of a large number of medicines in Ireland, including the weight loss drug Saxenda and the drug Ozempic which is often prescribed for patients with diabetes.

Earlier this month, it was reported that around 350 medicines were out of stock or in short supply in Ireland, according to the Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA), up from 250 at the start of the year.

The proposed new legislation also would see the law amended to support vaccination programmes by allowing the administration of vaccines by a wider range of suitable qualified professionals.

It would also herald changes for potential medical card holders who wish to use the Rent-a-Room scheme in their homes, with a disregard for Rent-a-Room income of up to €14,000 a year from medical card assessment.

This comes as part of plans by the Government to remove any potential barriers to participation in the Rent-A-Room scheme.

Commission for older people

Elsewhere, it is understood that Donnelly and the Minister for Older People, Mary Butler will seek Cabinet approval this morning for an independent commission to examine health and social care services and supports for older persons.

It’s expected that the Commission will examine the services provided for older persons by the HSE, NGOs and other entities like home care and day service provider.

It will be asked to make recommendations to Government on the strategic development of health and social care services and supports for older persons.

It will also examine residential care settings and models of supported living.

The Commission is due to be established before the end of this year and is expected to complete its work in phases.

Planning and Development Bill

Also at Cabinet, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien will bring the updated Planning and Development Bill before ministers this morning also.

If passed, the Bill will introduce statutory timelines for planning applications (ranging from 18 weeks for appeals to 48 weeks for more complex issues) in what will be one of the biggest legislative overhauls in the history of the Oireachtas.

First published earlier this year, the Bill will introduce wide ranging reform of the planning system and intends to speed up the planning process and in turn help speed up the delivery of housing.

Some of these reforms include how judicial reviews are brought, with the Bill changing how residents associations can take cases against planning decisions, as well as introducing an extension on the time local development plans are in effect.

The Bill will also introduce a significant overhaul of An Bord Pleanála, which will be reorganised into An Coimisiún Pleanála.

The restructure comes in the wake of the controversy in the planning body last year, which resulted in Chairperson Dave Walsh opting to retire early in November.

This reorganisation will see the introduction of Planning Commissioners and a Governing Executive, as well as the separation of both decision-making and the corporate roles.

On the decision-making side, there will be 14 Planning Commissioners alongside a Chief Planning Commissioner. These roles will replace the existing chairperson and board member roles.

The Governing Executive will be responsible for the governance of An Coimisiún Pleanála, with a Chief Executive and seven non-executive members.

As a result of the Planning and Development Bill, the Government is understood to want to make judicial reviews of planning decisions a “waste of time”.

Judicial reviews are cases taken by citizens or groups to the High Court. In recent years, such cases have been used to challenge decisions made by An Bord Pleanála on large-scale property developments around the country.

Under the Planning and Development Bill, resident associations will be required to have a named individual or group of individuals commence a judicial review going forward, rather than bringing it forward as a broader residents’ association.

There will also be timelines set out for the entire judicial review process, from pleading cases to the delivery of a judgement.

However, some have been critical of the Bill with former Chief Justice, Frank Clarke claiming last week that it could lead to lengthy legal delays as cases are referred to European courts.

As reported by The Business Post, Clarke warned that if the Government proceeds with proposed reforms, it would be “counterproductive”.

He said: “If the theory is to make quick decisions to allow proper development go ahead, creating a system where there will be references to the Court of Justice of the European Union and the inevitable delay before there’s clarity about the law seems to be counterproductive to the purpose it is intended.”

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Mark Cuban's Cost Plus Drug Company partnered with Community Health Systems to directly supply hospitals with essential drugs like epinephrine, addressing shortages through transparent pricing and innovative manufacturing processes.

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Content: Mark Cuban's drug company inks first health system partnership to sell directly to Community Health Systems

Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company has found its first national health system buyer for hospital drugs currently in short supply.

Franklin, Tennessee-based for-profit Community Health Systems has signed onto a partnership with the billionaire-backed manufacturer to purchase pharmaceuticals like epinephrine and norepinephrine for its affiliate hospitals in Texas and Pennsylvania. The products are often used in emergency departments and intensive care units, with epinephrine currently listed on the Food and Drug Administration’s list of ongoing drug shortages.

Though the collaboration is beginning with just two states, the companies said they “expect to scale the partnership in numerous and meaningful ways.”

“Our partnership with CHS will give them access to epinephrine and norepinephrine at a transparent cost plus price,” Cuban said in a release. “This is the start of what we know will be an amazing partnership that will reduce drug shortages and drug costs and enhance the care CHS hospitals provide for their patients."

CHS spans 71 hospital affiliates with about 12,000 beds across 15 states and recently reported $12.5 billion in 2023 net operating revenues. It, like other hospitals and health systems across the country, has disclosed rising pharmaceutical spending in recent years.

The companies’ announcement framed the deal as a long-term collaboration “to address critically important issues related to drug supply in the hospital setting.”

Beyond high costs or shortages, these issues can include large amounts of pharmaceutical waste and potential dosage errors when medications need to be measured at the bedside. Cost Plus Drugs can help CHS avoid these by allowing the hospitals “more flexible ordering opportunities” including alternative vial sizes that aren’t offered by other drug manufacturers, the organizations said.

“There are many opportunities for innovation in the healthcare industry, including rethinking, and even disrupting, the way providers purchase products and services,” Lynn Simon, M.D., president of healthcare innovation and chief medical officer at CHS, said in the announcement. “Our relationship with Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company has the potential to generate significant advantages for our affiliated hospitals and for other forward-looking hospital organizations that also want to reduce costs, reduce waste, avoid drug shortages and improve patient care.”

Cost Plus Drug Company currently offers about 2,500 generic medications and works directly with drug manufacturers to bypass middlemen and lower prices. For consumers, the price of each drug includes a 15% markup as a profit margin, a $3 pharmacy handling fee and a $5 shipping fee. Cost Plus also transparently displays what it pays for its medicines.

The company has proven itself a disrupter on both generic drug pricing and the drug benefits market, where it currently works with at least four pharmacy benefit managers and supplanted major names like CVS Health’s Caremark with its inaugural payer deals.

Of note, the CHS partnership announcement comes just days after Cost Plus Drug Company kicked off manufacturing of generic sterile injectables at a new 22,000-square-foot, $11 million facility it built in Dallas. That plant is outfitted with aseptic robotic manufacturing lines and is slated to initially produce commercial batches of epinephrine and norepinephrine with pediatric chemotherapy products next in line.

During a roundtable discussion held this week at the White House, Cuban admitted that that Cost Plus Drug Company is “not making money yet” but promised the business will eventually become self-sustainable.

The COVID-19 pandemic continued to disrupt global supply chains post-2021, leading to shortages of critical medical supplies such as molecular and immunoassay kits, life-support machines, and drugs due to raw material and transportation interruptions.

Title:

Content: Life Science Tools in Healthcare Market Assessment, By Type, By Technology, By Product, By End-user, By Region, Opportunities and Forecast, 2016-2030F

Life Science Tools in Healthcare Market Assessment, By Type [Instruments, Consumables, Services], By Technology [Genomics, Proteomics, Cell Biology Technology, Lab Supplies, and Others], By Product [Liquid Chromatography, Mass Spectrometry, Liquid Chromatography, Flow cytometry, and Others], By End-user [Healthcare, Government & Academic Institutions, Biopharmaceutical Companies, Industrial Applications, and Others], By Region [North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, South America, Middle East and Africa], Opportunities and Forecast, 2016-2030F.

Lyon, FRANCE

New York, June 28, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Life Science Tools in Healthcare Market Assessment, By Type, By Technology, By Product, By End-user, By Region, Opportunities and Forecast, 2016-2030F" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p06470964/?utm_source=GNW

Global Life Science Tools market size was valued at USD 151.28 billion in 2022 which is expected to reach USD 315.66 billion in 2030 with a CAGR of 9.63% for the forecast period between 2023 and 2030. The rapid development of life sciences tools and technologies such as gene sequencing, mass spectroscopy, chromatography, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), and other varied goods is contributing to innovation.

Additionally, the market is being driven by factors such as increasing investments by biopharmaceutical companies for the creation of advanced therapies, increasing need for novel medicines and treatments, rapid adoption of instruments such as flow cytometers, spectrometers, microscopes, chromatography columns, nucleic acid processing equipment and increasing prevalence of chronic diseases such as cancer, diabetes, thyroid disorders and many others.

The development of molecular diagnostic techniques such as digital droplet PCR, next-generation sequencing (NGS), and genome-wide sequencing has led to the introduction of DNA testing in clinical settings. For instance, Illumina, a global leader in DNA sequencing, and Genoscreen, a genomics company announced their partnership in October 2022 to speed up ending tuberculosis globally. This collaboration aims to enhance resources and skills in nations greatly affected by tuberculosis, such as India, to improve the efficiency of identifying and fighting against multidrug-resistant TB.

Increasing Demand for Biopharmaceuticals

The growing need for biologics, which often utilize recombinant DNA technology, is expected to fuel the expansion of the life science tools market. Biopharmaceuticals offer advantages such as increased efficacy, reduced adverse effects, minimized risk of drug interactions and improved patient outcomes. To meet the increasing demand and enhance the production of biological treatments, the life science industry is currently focusing on advanced analytical models such as predictive analytics. These cutting-edge innovations are being facilitated by significant technological improvements such as laboratory upgrades, strategic advancements, and operational optimizations. The demand for biopharmaceutical products has increased due to their enhanced safety, effectiveness, and ability to cure previously untreatable medical conditions.

Rapid Technological Advancements

Technological advancements have led to the growing utilization of various tools in the field, such as next sequencers, PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) and qPCR (quantitative polymerase chain reaction) machines, flow cytometers, spectrometers, microscopes, chromatography columns, nucleic acid processing equipment, and cell biology instruments. These advancements have had a significant impact on the integration of DNA assays in clinical settings, specifically in molecular diagnostic techniques like digital droplet PCR, NGS, and genome-wide sequencing. These methods have improved accuracy, timeframe, and reproducibility. To effectively harness the therapeutic potential of circulating nucleic acids, it is crucial to have an efficient extraction process.

Becton , Dickinson and Company (BD), a prominent global medical technology company, and Labcorp, a premier life sciences company, announced a strategic collaboration in August 2022. The collaboration aims to establish a framework for the development, production, marketing, and commercialization of companion diagnostics (CDx) based on flow cytometry. These CDx solutions are designed to complement the administration of potentially life-altering therapies for cancer and similar diseases.

Healthcare Sector is Experiencing Rapid Growth

The healthcare sector emerged as the leading contributor to the market value in 2022 and is expected to exhibit significant growth throughout the forecast period. This segment encompasses clinics, hospitals, community centers, diagnostic laboratories, and physician offices. The increasing adoption of proteomic and genomic workflows in hospitals for the diagnosis and treatment of various clinical abnormalities is predicted to drive market growth. The healthcare sector’s expansion is primarily attributed to the extensive utilization and demand for tissue diagnostic solutions in hospitals. Clinicians are increasingly opting for tissue-based diagnostic tests over conventional methods due to their quick turnaround time. The integration of genomic sequencing in hospitals and clinical settings is predicted to improve patient care and reduce healthcare costs. This development is expected to drive the rapid growth of the healthcare sector. Furthermore, advancements in tools and equipment have significantly enhanced the accuracy of complex medical procedures in hospitals. The precision and reliability of medical diagnostic outcomes largely rely on the laboratory tools utilized for analysis, which positively impacts the expansion of the market.

For Instance, in January 2023, QIAGEN entered into an exclusive strategic agreement with Helix, a population genomics company based in California. According to the recently disclosed agreement, QIAGEN will have exclusive rights to market and handle contracts for Helix’s companion diagnostic services within the United States. This collaboration will utilize the Helix Laboratory Platform, which has received the pioneering de novo class II authorization from the U.S. Food & Drug Administration for a comprehensive exome sequencing platform.

Growth of Cell and Gene Therapies is Propelling Market Growth

The utilization of genomic technologies on a global scale is on the rise, leading to advancements in diagnostic tests and procedures for various diseases and driving the growth of the market. A recent example is the commercial launch of a new molecular polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay for the monkeypox virus by Becton, Dickinson, and Company (BD) and CerTest Biotec in September 2022, targeting both the United States and global markets. It is important to note that this PCR assay is currently intended for research purposes only. With the introduction of such innovative products, the market is expected to experience robust growth throughout the projected period. A comprehensive understanding of cell biology has emerged as an asset in laboratory workflows, creating new opportunities for market expansion. Furthermore, scientists in the life science field are keen to adopt cutting-edge instruments, which is anticipated to further strengthen this segment. Companies such as Cytiva, BioTek Instruments, Horizon Discovery, and Seahorse Bioscience are introducing instruments related to cell analysis, cell biology and imaging. The demand for tools and equipment is being propelled by the rising research and development activities conducted by prominent industrial companies.

A notable example is the strategic partnership between Haihe and EdiGene Laboratory, announced in January 2022, aimed at developing platform technologies and stem regenerative cell treatments. This collaboration focuses on exploring advanced biomarkers to enhance quality control in stem cell production.

Impact of COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on the life science tools industry and their respective supply chains worldwide. This disruption can be attributed to several factors, including the scarcity of raw materials and labor, as well as interruptions in the transportation of these materials across regions. As a result, there has been a shortage of critical medical supplies in different parts of the world, including molecular and immunoassay kits, digital solutions, life-support machines, and drugs. The COVID-19 pandemic had spurred a competitive race among manufacturers to create rapid diagnostics for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 virus, resulting in remarkable advancements and breakthroughs in terms of innovative solutions. These tests utilize various methods such as PCR for detecting the SARS-CoV-2 nucleic material, nucleic acid hybridization-related techniques, or serological and immunological assays for detecting antibodies produced in response to the virus.

For instance, in December 2021, Siemens Healthineers obtained emergency use authorization from the FDA for its ‘Clinitest’, a rapid COVID -19 antigen self-test, that can be self-administered by individuals aged 14 and above.

Key Players Landscape and Outlook

The market is characterized by strong competition as numerous players offer similar products. These players are consistently expanding their product portfolios and introducing new platforms through extensive research and development efforts to maintain their market position. Moreover, major companies are undertaking strategic initiatives such as collaborations, mergers and acquisitions, and new product launches to drive market growth and intensify competition. For example, in February 2022, Agilent Technologies, Inc. formed a partnership with Biosciences, Inc. to integrate the AVITI System with SureSelect target enrichment panels, aiming to provide customers with improved access to genomic tools. This initiative was anticipated to create fresh growth opportunities for the company.
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Medication shortages disproportionately impacted vulnerable populations, such as those in rural areas, where logistical challenges and insufficient production capacity exacerbated the issue, leading to delays in drug delivery and limited access to essential treatments.

Low-income communities faced heightened disparities during shortages, as smaller healthcare facilities often lacked the resources to stockpile medications, leaving patients unable to access necessary treatments or travel to larger centers with better supplies.

In some cases, patients in underserved areas were forced to ration medications or rely on alternative therapies, which sometimes led to adverse health outcomes, highlighting the need for improved coordination and equitable distribution systems.

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Content: Saturday 13 July 2024
Chairman of the Board of Directors and Editors
Abdurrahim Ali
Editor-in-Chief
Dalia Abdul Rahim
Chairman of the Board of Directors and Editorial Board
Abdurrahim Ali
Editor-in-Chief
Dalia Abdul Rahim
Reports & Investigations
A “cure ” for the lack of medicine.
News portal monitors the suffering of health insurance patients..
Health Minister Apologizes to Citizens
Head of the division: Insistence on using the trade name exacerbates the problem
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Hundreds of chronic disease patients from health insurance clinics suffer from a lack of treatments and medicines, especially diabetics; because of the lack of insulin and many other medicines that are not available, where the journey of great suffering begins after the patient leaves the examination room and the doctor writes the necessary treatment in the prescription, to surprise patients that the treatment does not exist and he has to look for it himself.
In this report, "Al-Bawaba News" monitors the suffering of patients looking for medicine in light of the lack of the market of local and imported medicines in health insurance pharmacies and free market pharmacies, where « Al-Bawaba » met "Amina", a 50-year-old woman suffering from diabetes, went to health insurance in the city of Al-Mahalla Al-Kubra, in an attempt to get her treatment to clash with reality. The health insurance deducts a fixed monthly subscription for her treatment, but the head of the pharmacy inside Ibn Sina Clinic in Mahalla Al-Kubra confirmed that the treatment is not currently available, and that the patient must go to three pharmacies affiliated with the Health Insurance Authority, and three pharmacies outside it affiliated with the Health Insurance also, to get the medicine.
"Amina" did not despair of attempts and despite her illness, she went to 6 pharmacies affiliated with health insurance inside and outside the headquarters and did not find sugar medicines available, even she did not find it in the free market in various pharmacies.
The suffering continues.
Amina ’ s condition is not unique in the midst of a hustle of medication shortages, as Menna Magdy from Giza also complained about the lack of insulin and tapes needed for a glucose meter, which has become rare.
“Mina ”, the mother of a diabetic child, said:“ I am a son diagnosed from 1 year and 4 months with diabetes type I take Novo Rapid and sediment, of course we are supposed to take insulin from insurance and imposed according to measurements, but they do not need enough insulin in the middle of the lack of drugs, and when Benji I spend the treatment every two months..
We have to take medicine from other patients. ”
She pointed out that there is a clear suffering that appears in the patient groups and we are trying together to find solutions to the shortage of drugs, insulin and tapes, even in pharmacies in free markets we do not find.
She added in desperation: "We kept reducing the quantities of medicine against our will and from how many days of insulin ended up on the pharmacies of October all so that I find one Novo pen but not you."
In the governorate of Ismailia, despite the application of comprehensive health insurance in the governorate, but she has seen a shortage of medicines inside pharmacies, "Rawda", a mother of two diabetics, says that she suffers from the provision of medicines to her children with immune diabetes, where for the past 3 months she was unable to provide medicine from health insurance.
She added that after suffering a few doses were dispensed and without sugar measurement strips, and added that some substitutes of drugs for diabetes led to double pathological symptoms, where one of her children suffered from a high cumulative rate of up to 15 and enter the intensive care.
She pointed out that the shortage of medicines is not only in health insurance pharmacies and the public sector, but in free pharmacies, where she is looking for medicines in her province and neighboring provinces in order to obtain the prescribed doses of sugar for her sons.
Lack of medicines
Dr. Mahmoud Fouad, Executive Director of the Right to Medicine Association, stressed that there is a shortage of many medicines for many diseases such as immunological diseases, Mediterranean anemia, SLE, Duchenne diseases, muscular dystrophy, neurologic and psychological drugs, in addition to some hormone drugs.
Fouad explained in a statement to "Al-Bawaba News", that diabetics suffer from the lack of availability of some diabetes drugs, especially popular insulin, although there is an increase in the recent drug varieties to more than 30% of the drugs.
Fouad pointed out that there are some traders who store medicines in stores to offer them in the market at new prices, in addition to many problems related to imported medicines, which have also increased their price significantly.
Fouad pointed out that there is a new increase in a large number of items in the coming days by up to 50% and up to 80% for imported medicines.
In the same context, Dr. Ali Auf, head of the medicine division of the Federation of Chambers of Commerce, said that the problem of medicine shortage is not only related to the provision of medicine from the state or pharmaceutical factories, but also related to the culture of the citizen in dealing with these medicines.
The head of the medicine division said in statements to "Al-Bawaba News" that the citizen deals badly with drugs in two cases, the first of which is to store a large amount in the case of a shortage and then provide it in pharmacies; for fear of suffering in obtaining it if shortage, and thus causes this behavior to deprive other patients to get their doses on time.
He added that the other wrong behavior is the use of essential drugs to treat some diseases such as diabetes in the treatment of another disease such as obesity, and therefore drugs are consumed at a higher rate than the production of companies, which makes the period of the end of the crisis longer than necessary.
He pointed out that most sugar medicines (pills) are available under the scientific name and not the commercial name, and that local insulin is manufactured internally and 85% of the insulin available in Egypt is local production, but the production covers the needs of health insurance and hospitals of the Ministry of Health and the government sector.
He added that there is a crisis in imported insulin, where it is available only by 15%, and international factories adhere to a production plan, and therefore in the case of increased consumption of drugs is not increased production in the actual time for the shortage of medicine, and thus patients in the local market resort to Egyptian insulin shows demand for medicine, which is a pressure and shows cases of drug shortage.
He pointed out that there is a near breakthrough to provide medicine, and that it is easy for Egyptians to deal with the scientific name and not commercial, and in case of any drug shortage, call the ambulance pharmacies available in Greater Cairo and the governorates through the hotline 16682 or call the Drug Authority on the hot number 15301; to find out where any medicines are missing and the scientific alternative to it.
For its part, the Drug Authority explained through its official page on Facebook that there are many alternatives to authentic medicines and all of them are safe and have the same effect and effectiveness as the original medicine; pointing out that the alternative medicine, is a medicine composed of an active substance different from the original medicine, but it is used to treat the same disease.
The Egyptian Medicines Authority advised that you should consult your doctor or pharmacist before using an alternative medicine as they can help you ensure that the alternative medicine is suitable for you and that it will not interact with any other medicines you are taking.
In the same context, the Authority said in a press release that Dr. Ali Al-Ghamrawi, President of the Egyptian Drug Authority, received a delegation of representatives of local companies and the Chamber of Pharmaceutical Industry to discuss ways of cooperation between the Authority, companies and the Chamber to provide medicines and necessary supplies in the Egyptian market.
Promises of the new government
In his first remarks to the new government on the crises of medicine, Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly said today in a press conference that the pharmaceutical sector in Egypt follows the private sector, and that the state is coordinating with the private sector to reduce the prices of medicine, stressing that the state is keen to stabilize the prices of medicine, especially that the Egyptian medicine is cheaper than most countries in the world.
He explained that the state is procuring the dollar to provide raw materials for manufacturing, and that the import of raw material at the daily price of the dollar caused great losses to the state.
Timeline
On the lack of medicine, the Prime Minister said that the drug prices were coordinated by the Drug Authority after developing a plan with the companies for the absence of any shortage of medicines in the coming period, and explained that the drug productivity takes a great time in manufacturing and therefore there is a shortage of medicines in the markets, pointing out that the coming period will witness a great abundance of medicines.
For his part, Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Health, revealed that the drug file is important and has a dimension in the Egyptian national security, and affected like any commodity with dollar components during the last year and a half in light of the existence of global crises.
He explained that since the beginning of the crisis and the perception of the lack of currency to cover the needs, priorities have been set so that the citizen does not feel a shortage, stressing that the guests from Gaza and Sudan are all additions that affected the requirements of production and the basics of the pharmaceutical industry of raw materials.
He added that there were deficiencies in some types of medicines, but there are alternative or similar medicines and this culture is not approved by many, in the absence of the medicine written by the doctor they say it is incomplete.
Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Health, continued that Egypt is the cheapest country in the world in medicine, and the unable is not affected by the high prices of medicine, adding that the state provides it and the Egyptian pharmaceutical industry covers 95% of the needs.
He added that there are 69 million citizens who are insured in the health insurance system that has existed since the 1960s, in addition to the beneficiaries of treatment decisions at the expense of the state.
Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Health, said that the drug pricing procedures are the prerogatives of the Egyptian Drug Authority, pointing out that the increase in drug prices will be in the range of 30 to 35%.
The minister apologized.
The Minister of Health apologized to the citizens for the shortage of some medicines in the markets during the recent period, stressing that during the next few months there will be no shortage of imported or local medicines, as the import of raw materials began to restart production and will be in cooperation with the entire minister to take care of the pharmaceutical industry.
He added that the state is keen to provide all the necessary capabilities for the treatment of patients and the provision of medicines, and that there is an upcoming international cooperation with the international institution "Gustav" for the treatment of tumors in France, which does not have a presence outside France.
It receives patients from all over the world, which is the center of excellence for the treatment of tumors in the world, and the efforts of the Egyptian government have been successful in persuading it to receive the center with all its competencies and expertise to participate the Ministry of Health in the work of a hospital in Egypt.
He explained that Egyptian doctors will be trained abroad to transfer international experiences and expertise to Egypt, stressing that the citizen will be treated at the highest international level without incurring any dime, but paid instead by the state through health insurance.
He stressed the completion of 24 projects to develop hospitals at a cost of 7.34 billion pounds, adding that there are 20 new projects in 11 governorates and these hospitals will operate with a capacity of 2,747 beds.
Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Health, said that the presidential initiatives launched by President Sisi led to an increase in the average age of the Egyptian human being.
Dr. Abdul Ghaffar explained that the national projects plan from 2025 to 2026, stressing that it includes 54 projects in 24 governorates in the Republic and will operate with a capacity of 9588 beds.
Dr. Abdel Ghaffar added that the comprehensive health insurance project will end in 2030 and will cover all governorates of the Republic, stressing that Egypt has received thousands of sick and injured cases coming from the Gaza Strip, and will be assisted in rebuilding the health system in the Gaza Strip within the framework of Egyptian assistance to the brothers.