Vietnam-made medicines are losing out to due consumers’ and doctors’
obsession with foreign products.
According to the Ministry of
Health (MoH), Vietnam is home to 178 drug-makers and more than 300 oriental
medicine facilities, meeting 50 per cent of the demand for prevention and
treatment of diseases. In addition, locally-made medicine is also shipped to
other markets such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Singapore, Laos and Cambodia.
However, the use of domestic medicines in hospitals and clinics is scarce.
MoH statistics show that
hospitals only spent 47 per cent of budgets on domestic medicines, down as
compared with 2007, at 49 per cent. Especially, central-level hospitals spent
merely 12 per cent on locally-made drugs. Meanwhile, district-level hospitals
hit the highest rate, at 62 per cent.
“The modest rates are resulted
from the psychology of preferring foreign medicines to local ones by doctors
and patients,” said MoH Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien.
Another reason was prescribers
receive a ‘commission’ from foreign pharmaceutical firms so many prescriptions
contain expensive medicines, she added.
Le Van Nha Phuong, vice general
director of Domesco Medical, said: “Domestic medicines are inferior to foreign
ones due to the psychology of preferring foreign products.”
Currently, the quality of
Vietnam-made pharmaceuticals are equivalent to that of the imported ones, while
prices of domestic medicines account for only 20-40 per cent of foreign
pharmaceuticals, said Phuong.
“Many people think the more
expensive medicine is, the more effective it brings. It is wrong. Imported
pharmaceuticals are expensive because of high production costs in foreign
countries, plus transportation costs and import taxes,” he noted.
Le Van Truyen, former deputy
Minister of the MoH, said domestic pharmaceutical makers have not conveyed
information about the quality of their products to prescribes. Secondly, state
pharmaceutical management bodies must convey messages about the quality of
domestic pharmaceuticals to patients and the medical circle. Thirdly, when
entering the World Trade Organization, Vietnam lacked technical barriers to
low-quality imported medicines, causing mixtures for consumers who think
foreign medicines must be better than domestic ones. Finally, granting state
budget to hospitals and health insurances must be considered a financial tool
to control the use of medicines in hospitals and health insurance bodies.
“Vietnamese pharmaceutical
producers must prove the quality of their products. When we feel secure about
the quality of pharmaceuticals we will surely use,” said a doctor from
Hanoi-based state-run Bach Mai Hospital.
Nguyen Tien Quyet, director of
Vietnam-Germany Hospital, said “The conscience of doctors is to ensure their
patients get better. We support the viewpoint of using local medicines with a
condition that such medicines must cure diseases for patients.”
According to the MoH, Vietnam
spent $1.1 billion on medicines in 2008, $1.2 billion in 2009 and is estimated
to expense $1.7 billion in 2013. By 2015, the country also targets to satisfy
some 60 per cent of pharmaceuticals for prevention and treatment of diseases
and increase the rate of using local medicines at central-level hospitals by
three percentage points, at provincial and city-level hospitals by four
percentage points and at district-level hospitals by five percentage points. In
addition, Vietnam also targets that all pharmaceutical trading and making
facilities will reach good manufacturing practice standard by 2015.
Kieu Linh | vir.com.vn
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