P75 B in RP pharmaceutical industry lost to corruption

MANILA, Philippines – Almost half of the P150-billion business of the pharmaceutical industry has been lost to corrupt and unethical practices, a think tank said yesterday.

Roberto Pagdanganan, Medicine Transparency Alliance (META) vice chairman, cited reports of Transparency International that up to P75 billion is lost and many patients do not get appropriate treatment.

“If we can eliminate these practices, the prices of medicine can go down by as much as 50 percent,” he said.

Speaking to reporters at the launching of the National Awards on Good Governance for Medicine (GGM), Pagdanganan said these losses are passed on to patients, causing the prices of medicine to soar.

Pagdanganan serves as head of the technical working group for GGM, which was initiated by the World Health Organization to curb corruption in medicine regulation and supply.

Dr. Guitelle Baghdadi-Sabeti, a technical officer for Medicine Policy and Standard at WHO-Geneva, said some $3 trillion are spent worldwide on health services every year.

“Unethical practices and corruption can be found throughout the medicine chain from research and development and clinical trial… to inspection,” she said.

Sabeti sought punitive sanctions against those involved in irregularities.

These practices include tax evasion, cartel, counterfeit/substandard, unethical donations and unethical promotions, among others.

Such practices must be stopped because they impact not only on health but on the economy of a country as well, Sabeti said. 

The global pharmaceutical industry reaches P600 billion but 10 to 25 percent of spending on public procurement of medicine is lost to corruption.

Two thirds of medicine supply is also lost through fraud practices in hospitals.   – Sheila Crisostomo