The Pakistan Pharmaceutical Manufacturers’ Association (PPMA) has warned the federal government that any decision to discontinue import of raw material of medicines from India will weaken the country’s ability to fight the coronavirus. The warning to this effect came as the office-bearers of PPMA addressed a press conference here at Press Club on Monday. The PPMA representatives appealed to the federal government that it should continue with the existing arrangements of import of drugs’ raw material. Any decision to disrupt the international supply chains associated with the Pakistani pharmaceutical industry will lessen the ability of the country’s medical practitioners to treat the cases of Covid-19. Speaking on the occasion, PPMA Senior Vice-Chairman Syed FarooqBukhari said that import of pharmaceutical raw material from India or from any other country was done under a well-regulated regime being overseen by the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan and other relevant state agencies. “We are in a virtual state of war against Covid-19 whose cases have been on the rise in Pakistan as the pharmaceutical industry is the backbone of the national apparatus put in place to fight the menace of coronavirus,” he said. He said that the vital inputs of the pharmaceutical industry should remain readily available to the drug manufacturers so that there was no shortage of essential medicines in the country during the current health emergency. “From the day one of the anti-coronavirus lockdown in the country the pharmaceutical industry has been doing its best continue with its production so that there is no shortage of medicines during the on-going health crisis,” he said.
