A recent survey by the World Health Organisation (WHO) of seven popular medicines shows that the drug price in Vietnam is 5-40 times higher than world prices.

VietNamNet Bridge – A recent survey by the World Health Organisation (WHO) of seven popular medicines shows that the drug price in Vietnam is 5-40 times higher than world prices.

Pham Luong Son, Vietnam Social Insurance’s Health Assessment Chief, revealed these statistics on the sideline of a conference in Hanoi on June 24.

In early April, the Ministry of Health’s medicine inspection proved that drug traders sold pharmaceuticals five times higher than imported prices. Some drugstores located in hospitals sold medicines for even higher rates.

At present, hospitals still purchase medicines for patients covered by health insurance, resulting in high prices. Vietnam Social Insurance will deal with this by directly purchasing medicines for insured patients.

According to Son, a recent doctoral thesis written with the participation of the WHO exposed this phenomenon. This organization agreed to make the research public, which will be presented at a workshop on managing drug prices paid by health insurance agency on June 26.

PV