It comes amid fears of a major pharmaceutical disaster due to widespread looting and destruction that has affected scores of pharmacies and pharmaceutical factories in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum.
In light of the overwhelming chaos that accompanied the two-week fighting between the army and the Rapid Support Forces, a number of pharmacies, factories, businesses and pharmacies in large areas of the capital, Khartoum , have been exposed over the past three days, greatly affecting the stock of medicines, which was already suffering from a shortage of more than 70 million pounds per cent of life-saving drugs.
The Association of Professional Pharmacists of Sudan expects a major shortage of medicines which threatens to cause a catastrophe in the country’s health sector, noting that the lack of medicines increases the fragility of the health system in Sudan, in particular in light of the storming of hospitals and health centers. centres, more than 70% of which are out of service.
Salah Jaafar, spokesperson for the Association of Professional Pharmacists, told Sky News Arabia that the scarcity and lack of medical and medical supplies from health centres, hospitals and pharmacies portends a health disaster that is difficult to control.
Jaafar highlighted the great suffering faced by patients and their families in light of the closure of most pharmacies for security reasons.
In addition to the extreme scarcity of many major types of drugs, the prices of drugs and medical solutions have increased by more than 300 percent in the past few days, adding to the suffering of patients in a country where more than 60 percent of its population of about 40 million people live below the poverty line. .
Jaafar revealed serious repercussions resulting from high drug prices and scarcity represented by the spread of the phenomenon of counterfeit and smuggled drugs, which pose a great threat to people’s lives.
Jaafar warns that the continuation of the current situation in the pharmaceutical sector will lead to an increase in death rates or an extension of the period of the disease.
Before the outbreak of the fighting, the characteristics of the drug crisis had begun to show clearly on the shelves of many public and private pharmacies which were almost empty, and there was great discontent among consumers because of the high prices of the few items available.
Concerns have increased recently that more than 160 small and large companies operating in the sector of production and import of pharmaceutical products in Sudan have stopped due to the sharp increase in drug registration fees, at a time where the local industry suffers from many obstacles and problems that hinder the possibility of increasing its market share.
Pharmacist Bahaa Al-Haj told Sky News Arabia that the great shortage of medicines is negatively affecting everyone, especially patients with chronic diseases, as some of them are forced to either give up some of the safe types ‘they used, either to reduce the doses, which puts their lives in danger.
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