Sharing about the current pharmaceutical production situation, Mr. Vu Tuan Cuong - Director of the Department of Drug Administration (Ministry of Health) said: In recent times, the pharmaceutical industry has still faced many difficulties and challenges.
First of all, domestic drug production is not yet highly competitive and sustainable: Drug production facilities mainly invest in production lines for simple dosage forms, and limit investment and application of technology to produce modern dosage forms.
Notably, the source of raw materials for domestic drug production still depends mainly on imports, accounting for nearly 90%.
"The dependence on imported raw materials, especially in the event of global crises (such as the COVID-19 pandemic), makes the pharmaceutical industry vulnerable to external factors such as exchange rate fluctuations or instability in supply sources; plus import costs make Vietnam's drug export prices about 20-25% higher than those of China and India," the Director of the Drug Administration analyzed.
In addition, the chemical and petrochemical industries have not yet developed, have not created a foundation and ecosystem to support the development of the pharmaceutical industry, and have not met the demand for pharmaceutical raw materials. The pharmaceutical chemistry program has been implemented for many years, but the results have not yet achieved the set goals.
Lack of human resources for development in some areas such as clinical pharmacy, quality management, and research and development of new drugs.
The implementation of clinical pharmacy activities in medical examination and treatment facilities still faces many difficulties due to lack of proper attention, the role of clinical pharmacy and pharmacists doing clinical pharmacy work in treatment has not been focused on. At the same time, there is no funding source to support clinical pharmacy activities.
Ensuring access to medicines is affected by the implementation of a number of related policies such as procurement bidding and health insurance payments.
The Director of the Drug Administration Department also said: The phenomenon of irrational use of drugs still occurs, and the sale of drugs without prescription is still quite common.
