BARBADIANS?will not be receiving any cheap watered down drugs from the Barbados Drug Service (BDS).
This was emphasised yesterday by Parliamentary Secretary in the Ministry of Health Senator Irene Sandiford-Garner as she moved the Barbados Drug Formulary (Validation) Bill in the Upper House.
She told the Senate that the validation process undertaken by the BDS only eliminated the duplication of drugs from the list, tightened loopholes and released some of the strain the service was under.
And she condemned persons, who she pointed out were going around circulating “disturbing misinformation” to the public “about what was in and what was out of the formulary”.
“I deem it reprehensible that individuals would seek to cause undue fear and panic in the hearts of people who are already vulnerable – who are already ill – by saying that Government was trying to do something that would shorten their lives by rationalising the drug formulary.
“I have read articles. I?have heard comments on the call-in programmes and I am appalled at the efforts that have been made to give the perception that this action is going to cause harm and danger to the sick people in this country. It is absolutely untrue and those persons who have been abroad perpetrating that perception ought to be ashamed of themselves,” the Senator said.
She charged:?“When you hear these comments being made you have to understand that they are done with an agenda. It could be a political agenda and sometimes it could be an economic agenda.”
In explaining the validation process, Sandiford-Garner said that it should have been undertaken every year.
“This exercise is the validation of all of the publications of the drug formulary. Under the law the drug formulary cannot be printed unless approved by order of the Minister and that approval must come to the House of Assembly and this has not been done in over 15 years.”
She said that every year since 1986 when the formulary was developed more drugs were added thereby putting the BDS under tremendous strain.
“What will change when we rationalize the new formulary is the number of drugs in the book that do the same function and that is where the confusion has come because you are hearing that we are going to cut the drug formulary in half,” Sandiford-Garner said, denying such claims and stressing that persons suffering with hypertension would not be disadvantaged.
She said the committee set up to review the formulary consisted of pharmacists and doctors, while advice was also sought from personnel from the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) and World Health Organisation (WHO).
She said major cost differentials were found between the same types of drugs used to treat the same illnesses.
She explained that it was recognized that because a drug was more expensive did not mean it was more therapeutic.
In addition, she said, PAHO?and WHO officials also advised that Government not keep the fixed dose combination (one tablet which contained multiple drugs) because the individual medication would do the same thing.
