Provide stimulus for pharmaceutical companies to scale up production

A senior economist has urged the government to release an emergency stimulus package to pharmaceutical companies in the country to scale up the production of basic hygiene products and medical supplies to help contain the coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

The Director of the Institute of Social, Statistical and Economic Research (ISSER) of the University of Ghana, Professor Peter Quartey, speaking to the Daily Graphic in an interview, said when local pharmaceutical companies were supported, they could produce enough to flood the markets to help reduce the prices of medical consumables.

Situation

The call comes at a time when health workers are appealing for more supplies of protective gear, coupled with the shortage of alcohol-based hand sanitisers on the local market, prompting price hikes.

Some people are also taking undue advantage of the situation to flood the markets with fake hand sanitisers.

Prof. Quartey said with many developed countries from where such products would have come becoming helpless, it was imperative for the government to act fast to support local pharmaceutical companies to produce more in readiness for any eventuality.

“These developments are likely to bring to nought the various efforts being made to prevent the spread of the disease, which has brought many economies around the world to their knees and got the world panicking,” he said.

In his third address to the nation over the weekend, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo urged local pharmaceutical companies to up their game by producing more sanitary products and medical supplies.

He pledged the commitment of the government to support the companies in that regard, but fell short of mentioning any amount.

WHO

Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has also called on industry and governments to increase the manufacture of essential drugs by 40 per cent to meet rising global demand.

It warned that severe and mounting disruption to the global supply of personal protective equipment (PPE), caused by rising demand, panic buying, hoarding and misuse, was putting lives at risk from the novel COVID-19 and other infectious diseases.

Healthcare workers, the WHO said, relied on PPE, such as gloves, medical masks, respirators, goggles, face shields, gowns and aprons, to protect themselves and their patients and said shortages were leaving doctors, nurses and other frontline workers dangerously ill-equipped to care for COVID-19 patients.

The Director-General of the WHO, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said in a release published on the website of the organisation: “Without secure supply chains, the risk to healthcare workers around the world is real. Industry and governments must act quickly to boost supply, ease export restrictions and put measures in place to stop speculation and hoarding. We can’t stop the COVID-19 without protecting health workers first.”