The Committee of Pharmacy Owners announced in a statement, in coordination with the head of the Pharmacists' Syndicate, Dr. Joe Saloum, that "as usual, whenever the dollar exchange rate rises, medicine importers cease delivering pharmacies their daily medication needs. This is amid the Ministry of Health's refusal to issue a new price index that reflects market reality, which naturally leads to the depletion of pharmacies' medication stock and threatens citizens' health security due to the interruption of a significant number of essential medications, especially those for chronic and emergency illnesses."
They confirmed that "our primary concern is to continue supplying our pharmacies with medications so we can fulfill our duty towards patients. Most importers have stopped delivering medications to pharmacies for more than 5 days now. During this time, pharmacists have continued to provide patients with their medications as usual; however, this cannot continue after importers announced they will not resume deliveries until a new price index is issued by the Ministry of Health."
The committee called on pharmacists to "close pharmacies on Tuesday, 2022/5/24, until 2 PM, and to hold a sit-in in front of the Ministry of Health at 9:30 AM to demand an end to the random smuggling of medications without any oversight from the Ministry of Health, which may include counterfeit, expired, or ineffective medications due to poor storage and transport, posing a significant risk to citizens' health. It is worth noting that most smuggled medications have locally manufactured alternatives of high quality and under the supervision of the Ministry of Health." They also demanded that the Minister of Public Health "establish a weekly medication index to ensure continuous distribution to pharmacies without interruption, so that the loss of medications does not occur with every change in the exchange rate."
