Privatisation of drug companies spells disaster, says MSF

US officials are privatising Kimadia, the country’s formerly state-run pharmaceutical industry, a move that may spell disaster for patients dependent on various drugs, head of the Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) NGO mission in Iraq maintained. Under the Oil-for-Food Programme in place since 1991, following international sanctions, Kimadia was stocked with medicine, both local and imported. Patients paid less than US $1 for any drugs prescribed by a doctor. Many of those drugs are sitting in warehouses around the country, but others were looted and are now sold in private pharmacies. "Privatising the pharmaceutical industry will make things run more efficiently, since Kimadia was corrupt and losing money under the old regime anyway," Col Scott Svabek, the chief operating officer of Kimadia under the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) running Iraq, told IRIN, in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. But Thomas Dehermann, head of MSF in Iraq, a France-based humanitarian group, disagreed. "Kimadia may not have worked efficiently, but it made low-cost medicine available to patients who needed it," he told IRIN in the capital. Most Oil-for-Food Programme contracts run out on 21 November. Under the programme, former president Saddam Hussein was allowed to sell oil to buy food and humanitarian supplies, including medicine. “How are they going to supply drugs after the Oil-for-Food Programme runs out?” Dehermann asked. “The United States wants to create the market in Iraq.” Svabek doesn’t sound too worried yet about whether prices will go up when drug contracts are privatised, because, he said, the country had plenty of stockpiles in warehouses that haven’t been used up yet. It will take months to issue current Oil-for-Food Programme drugs to patients, he maintained. Meanwhile, Talis Tahir Habib, a doctor who worked in a private clinic in 1968 when Kimadia was a private company, told IRIN that privatisation might make things go more smoothly. Under the government-run system, doctors see delays, sometimes enough to make the drugs expire before they reach Iraq, and shortages, Habib said. Rising prices could be a big issue though, said Muiz Ismail Al Amij, a medical officer for he World Health Organization (WHO) in Baghdad. But salaries may also rise in the next year or so, al Amij said in hope. “There will be more choices, anyway. Instead of one cough syrup, there might be 15 cough syrups,” Al Amij said, noting that the situation was not helpful to people who were sick. “In general, this situation is not helpful to the people who are sick.” The privatisation process will be a slow one as some contracts have been paid up until next year and there is no set timeframe for when Kimadia will be completely phased out. However, seven new private contracts should be ready to start this week. "Dental care, orthopedic support, vaccines and rabies treatment shots are all new private contracts ready to go," Svabek said. They will be given three-month contracts to enable the Ministry of Health to see how things are going under the new system. “My charter is to bring top-quality products into the country at a reasonable price,” Svabek added. “The whole process is being re-engineered by me,” he explained. Under the Oil-for-Food Programme, American and British companies were shut out of the bidding process. Now, both countries are allowed to bid. Tenders put out so far have received at least seven quotes each, according to Svabek; some have received 50. All bidding rules are posted on the CPA Web site.