‘Stoppage of medicine imports to cause crisis in Afghanistan’

KABUL (Pajhwok): Afghanistan Pharmaceutical Services Union (APSU) says imports of medicines have fallen to zero following restrictions on banks that resulted in depletion of all medicine supplies, warning of a humanitarian crisis if the problem is not solved.

After the fall of the former political system on August 15, freezing of Afghanistan assets in the US and banking restrictions, all trade activities in Afghanistan were affected.

Those who work the medicine field say that the import of medicine has been reduced to almost zero over the last three months and drug stores currently use reserved medicine previously imported by drug companies.

NematullahTawabAhmadzai, deputy director of APSU, and a shareholder in Afghan Surgical Company, during an interview with Pajhwok Afghan News said that after the political change in the country, the imports of medicines stopped like other products.

He says the drugs currently available in the market are imported by traders before the fall of the republic government.

“The freezing of Afghanistan assets and restrictions on banks caused a great damage to the private sector,” he said.

He is concerned about shortage of some types of drugs in the market and says some traders would import needed medicine from abroad to the country under the previous administration, but the imports have stopped after the regime change in the country.

“We have already expressed our concern through the union with the relevant bodies and asked them to share our problem with the Ministry of Finance to facilitate the transfer of money to traders who import medicine, but unfortunately no practical action has been taken so far,” he said.

He said that money transfer through banks took a month and a half and AIB, as one of top banks, was not able to transfer money to one of the largest pharmaceutical companies since the political change in the country.

Ahmadzai said 18 of 20 money transfers belonging to medicine traders were rejected by Da Afghanistan Bank (DAB) after a month and a half passed from the submission of the money, which he called a huge problem for traders.

Afghanistan will face a shortage of some medicines that are essential in surgeries if the problem is not solved in short time, he said.

Ahmadzai asked relevant departments to hear their suggestions and work on a procedure to resolve the current problem.

Meanwhile, Mohammad Qasim, a member of the leadership board of the union, told Pajhwok that the imports of medicines into Afghanistan had stopped due to political change in the country.

“The situation is very worrying,” he said, noting that some medicine warehouses have now been run out of medicine. If the problem is not solved in the short term, Afghanistan will face a shortage of some important medicine in the near future, he warned.

He named some of medicines and said they were hardly accessible in the country markets.

Qasim said that 95 percent of Afghanistan’s medicines were imported from abroad and five percent produced domestically.

“Banking activities are limited and we cannot transfer money to companies to buy medicine,” he added.

“If the situation continues, Afghanistan will face a disaster and majority of our people will lose their lives due to lack of medicine…,” he said.

An official of the Ministry of Public Health, who wished to go unnamed, said that there were no legal barriers to imports of medicine to the country.

The official said that Afghanistan Food and Drug Authority (AFDA) was committed to creating required facilities for traders.

Mds/ma

م

Views: 269