- A potential price hike for prescription drugs dispensed by private pharmacies was averted on Friday as the government promised to pay outstanding subsidies through the national drug service.
The development came within 24 hours of Barbados TODAY reporting that the body representing the commercial pharmacists had warned that drug prices could go up or patients might be turned away from receiving state-subsidised drugs unless they could afford to buy them.
President of the Barbados Pharmaceutical Society Marlon Ward-Rogers had revealed that the Barbados Drug Service has not paid pharmacists for the last three months for medications on the National Drug Formulary, a list of drugs that are provided free or made more affordable to eligible patients.
Declaring that the pharmacists were entangled in a financial bind, Ward-Rogers said they could pass on the full cost of the listed drugs to patients to recoup the loss of income for those medicines that are sold from the formulary.
But on Friday, he had better news.
The association president declared that following talks with authorities on Friday, payment is expected to be forthcoming next week.
“A conversation took place and although nothing has been put in writing as yet, nothing official, we expect a resolution sometime next week when a payment is to be made,” Ward-Rogers told Barbados TODAY. “Today being Friday, it would not have been enough turnaround time to have the matter completed. We will wait, we will give them enough time to complete the process because we don’t want the patient to suffer. Healthcare workers’ first interest is the well-being of the patient.”
The pharmaceutical society’s leader contended that his members would not have implemented a worst-case scenario willy-nilly. That worst-case situation, he said, would be closing their doors.
But he reiterated that the patients cannot get what the pharmacies don’t have, referring to his statement on Thursday that pharmacists would not be able to replenish their stock if they don’t get the outstanding funds from the Government.
“Without these payments, obviously you know pharmacies have overheads, staff to pay and stuff like that; they wouldn’t be able to turn around and pay the suppliers for the same type of medication that would need to be dispensed,” Ward-Rogers said then.
“So, without that, most pharmacies are finding it hard to turn around and procure the correct medication and the correct amount of stock that would be needed to be dispensed.
“And if payments are not made, other things would have to come about. For example, you can’t dispense what you don’t have. Then patients may come and realise that certain things from the Drug Service they may not be able to purchase. However, the other items that may not be on the Drug Service they may still be able to get because those are not items that would be owed for us by the government.”
Acting Permanent Secretary Wayne Webster could not be reached on Friday, but Davidson Ishmael, the newly-appointed Minister of State in the Ministry of Health, told Barbados TODAY he was certain the ministry’s top civil servant was dealing with the issue as the officer responsible for overseeing the payments.
emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb
