Lebanon medicine importers warn foreign drugs running out

A Lebanese youth sets tires on fire during a protest in Beirut against dire living conditions amidst the ongoing economical and political crisis. The photo was taken on 28 June, 2021
AFP

Lebanon's medicine importers said on Sunday that they had run out of hundreds of essential drugs and warned of more shortages, as the country's dire financial crisis batters the health sector.

Lebanese are grappling with a raft of shortages, including petrol, as the caretaker government discusses lifting subsidies it can no longer afford amid what the World Bank says is one of the world's worst financial crises since the 1850s.

The local currency has lost more than 90 per cent of its value on the black market, but the central bank had been providing importers with dollars at a much more favourable official rate to cover a large part of the cost of imported drugs.

Medicine "imports have almost completely ground to a halt over the past month", the association of pharmaceuticals importers said in a statement.

The syndicate said the central bank has not released the promised dollars to pay suppliers abroad, who are owed more than $600 million in accumulated dues since December, and importers cannot obtain new lines of credit.

"Importing companies' stocks of hundreds of medicines to treat chronic and incurable diseases have run out," it warned.

"And hundreds more will run out through July if we cannot resume imports as soon as possible."

Syndicate head Karim Gebara told AFP that some drugs to treat cardiac diseases, high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer and multiple sclerosis were already out of stock.

If nothing is done, "the situation will be catastrophic by the end of July" depriving "hundreds of thousands of patients" of their medication, he warned.

On Thursday, Lebanese president Michel Aoun said he had agreed with ministers and the central bank chief to "continue subsidising medication and medical supplies" selected by the health ministry according to priority.