The health minister looked reassuring Thanos Pleurisabout treatment lack of specific medicines.

“We ensured the sufficiency of medicines“, – he stressed during an extraordinary press conference at the Ministry of Health and estimated that in the coming ten days the process will start market normalization and by the end of the month there will be a significant improvement, while he added that “the suffering will not be long from a lack of medicine and will not burden citizens financially”.

“No reason to worry parents, I am also a parent of two small children. There is antipyretics in fullnot necessarily original drugs, there are generics with the same therapeutic value, the market is fully secured,” he said and added: “There is no reason to worry,” because the healthcare system is secured.

As he mentioned, the biggest shortage problem is mainly antipyretic, antibiotics and medicines related to the lungs, such as breathed in and syrupsbut enough pediatric drugs.

“His hospitals and pharmacies EOPYY they have no problems – hospitals have generics“, – he said, stressing that the shortage problem occurs “only in pharmacies and branded packaging.”

He clarified that this government was not going to raise the price of medicines and added that December decreased by 7%. “The non-scarcity increase is due to drugs that are too cheap to be price adjusted and generics for which citizens have no co-payments and burdens,” he said.

“The fact that there is a shortage in countries with expensive medicines is a problem of production cuts,” he emphasized and stressed that “the most scandalous price increase occurred in 2018 under the SYRIZA government.” He also assured that there will be no horizontal price increase.

When asked about this, the Minister of Health assured that “no need to impose restrictions on over-the-counter drugs“, as “there are Greek generics”.

Mr. Plyuris stressed that our country is experiencing an increase 25-40% in consumption, due to a particularly increased number of infections.

To a related question, he unequivocally answered that the Greek pharmaceutical industry will cover the demand with generics for antipyretics, antibiotics and children’s medicines.

Video from the press conference

Prescription-only drugs are in short supply

The Minister of Health indicated that after meeting with representatives of the pharmaceutical industry, as well as with the Medical Association, a decision was made on additional measures of action.

He mentioned that prescription drugs that are in short supply will only be ordered electronicsso that the Ministry of Health could monitor the movement of the market.

According to him, they are currently being checked. 9 major pharmaceutical companies on whether they hold stocks and deliver them to the market.

Also in consultation with PEF, The production of generic drugs is gaining momentum from the Greek pharmaceutical industry.

Among other things, there will be ongoing information from EOF regarding what appropriate drugs, in addition to scarce brands, can be purchased citizen.

Physicians will also be informed to appropriate generic drugs are recommended – where there is a problem – in patients.

He stressed that it is very important that our country domestic pharmaceutical industryas many scarce drugs will be replaced by generics.

He noted that the government will not enter discussion of horizontal drug price increases.

And added that very cheap drugs 1,2, 3 euroswhich are unprofitable and are under the threat of withdrawal, there will be a price correction, which is not borne by the citizen and the insured.

“Therefore, any increases of a few cents or euros will not be transferred to the citizen,” he said.

Problem with infant formula

As the President of IFET noted, Giannis Sotiriou, has already begun searching for children’s syrups and inhalants from foreign markets and will have results in the coming days. “The problem is solved in branded children’s paracetamol syrups and special children’s antibiotics,” Mr. Plyuris said.

The IFET President noted that this year 34% increase in quantity in children’s syrups. “There were two factors that led to the lack of infant formula. Firstly, this is an increase in cases, and secondly, an increase in cases during the holiday season, when circulation from pharmacies is limited,” Mr. Sotiriou said, stressing that the solution to the problem will begin next week.

“In 7-10 days, the shortage of children’s over-the-counter medicines will gradually begin to normalize. We believe that in a month the situation will largely normalize,” he said.

ten meters

In the already taken measures related to limiting parallel exports and increasing the sufficiency of medicines in the country, the Minister decided to update the measures as follows: