Drop in medicine prices postponed after March

By Jean Christou

THE Cyprus Pharmaceutical Association (CPA) on Thursday welcomed reports that a second slated drop in medicine prices had been postponed for the time being.

Daily Phileleftheros quoted Health minister Philippos Patsalis as saying that a process was underway with stakeholders to complete the new pricing policy and that the promised cut in prices would be put off until then.

“The new price reductions will probably not come into effect in March as we had originally announced,” the minister was quoted as saying.

In January the health ministry slashed the price of almost 2,000 medicines by around 15.5 per cent on average, but in some cases the reductions were as high as 80 per cent.

Patsalis said at the time that further reductions of eight to 10 per cent would be put in place in March, and even more when the national health scheme came into effect.

The second round of cuts was opposed by the CPA and other stakeholders saying if prices fell aggressively it would cause problems down the line.

CPA head Avgoustinos Potamitis told the Cyprus Mail on Thursday that his association had not been informed by the ministry if the March cuts had been postponed. “We would welcome this news,” he said.  “It would be a step in the right direction.”

The CPA argument is that if prices are drastically cut the big companies abroad would not be interested in supplying medicines to Cyprus and there might even be a danger of them pulling out, leaving Cypriot patients without certain medicines.

The argument echoed last year’s World Health Organisation (WHO) report on medicine prices in Cyprus, which it said were among the most expensive in the world, but cautioned that a high price decline “may have adverse consequences… in terms of availability, and therefore needs to be studied carefully before being implemented”.

“The price cut should not be too substantial in order to ensure the continued supply of product on the Cypriot market and/or the discounts received in the public sector for these products,” the report said.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.