Egypt issued a presidential decree cancelling custom taxes on imported medications for incurable, chronic, psychiatric and neurological diseases in an attempt by the state to lower the prices of medications used by millions of Egyptians.
The move also aims to fix some imbalances in the current custom legislations for it to be consistent with international treaties signed by Egypt, according to a statement by presidential spokesman Alaa Youssef on Sunday.
The decision will also cover medications for tumors and organ transplantation, heart, blood vessels, and bilharzia, contraception.
Millions of Egyptians suffer from a variety of chronic diseases and relatively high drug prices.
Removing customs on some medications is not enough to solve the real problem which is Egypt's fixed drug-pricing system, deputy head at the Pharmacists Syndicate, Mohamed Seoudy, told Ahram Online.
“Keeping the prices of medicines over the past 20 years fixed while lowering some prices every now and then is not the solution … I am not asking for raising the prices of medicines but prices for medical products that cause losses must be amended,” he said, adding that public sector companies have lost over LE124 million over the past 3 years.
Meanwhile, Reem Al-Adl, Head of Corporate Communications & Public Affairs at Novartis Egypt told Ahram Online that her company is not yet aware of the pricing implications as they haven’t yet held a meeting with the ministry of health.
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