PHARMANIAGA Berhad has denied that it has “dominant grip and major influence” over the nation’s healthcare system, calling such accusations “baseless”.
According to the local pharmaceutical company, the government was not solely dependent on it for the supply of medicines as all measures are taken to “ensure a diversified supply chain to avoid over-reliance on a single company”.
“Contrary to the claims, the Health Ministry (MOH) spent approximately only 35% of its pharmaceutical spending via Pharmaniaga with the Group’s role limited to managing the logistics and distribution of the products as well as holding the drug stockpile in the tune of RM400 mil as of Dec 31, 2022,” Pharmaniaga said in a statement.
It was responding to remarks made by Galen Centre for Health and Social Policy CEO Azrul Mohd Khalib over the renewal of its concession to provide medicine and medical supplies to health ministry facilities.
In a report by health portal CodeBlue, Azrul said the exclusive concessions granted to companies like Pharmaniaga has created an “unhealthy over-dependence” on them.
He also called the government’s decision to grant a 10-year extension to Pharmaniaga a “major blow” to much-needed healthcare reforms in the country.
Pharmaniaga further noted that the selection of suppliers, products and prices is determined by MOH after concluding an open tender exercise.
“We believe that making a blanket statement that a single company, such as Pharmaniaga, has a dominant grip and major influence over large portions of our healthcare system in Malaysia is baseless,” it stressed.
It also rejected insinuations that the extension of its concession will discourage other pharmaceutical companies from doing business in Malaysia.
It said the supply of medicines on the Approved Product Purchase List (APPL) is based on a tender system.
“All winning tenders are decided by the health ministry. The concession given to Pharmaniaga is merely for the logistics and distribution of APPL products,” it noted.
“Currently, there are 729 APPL products, supplied by 96 companies that are selected via open tender.”
On Tuesday (April 18), Health Minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa confirmed that Pharmaniaga has been given a conditional agreement to continue supplying medical supplies to the government for another 10 years.
The local pharmaceutical company was previously given a conditional agreement for 10 years in January last year, which was subject to terms and conditions that were initially supposed to be finalised before last Dec 31.
The deadline was then extended to June this year. – April 21, 2023
Main pic credit: The Edge Markets
