Shehbaz Sharif slams federal government for raising medicine prices
Shehbaz Sharif slams federal government for raising medicine prices
LAHORE (Dunya News) - PML-N President and Leader of the Opposition in National Assembly Mian Shehbaz Sharif has criticized the federal government for increasing prices of over 90 different medicines.
In his Twitter message, Mian Shehbaz Sharif wrote that the increase in medicine prices up to 262% by the federal government is an injustice with the poor people of Pakistan.
He said that raising the prices of life-saving drugs is evident of the government’s maliciousness and corruption. The opposition leader said that the government has even taken away people’s right to live.
Earlier in the day, the federal government approved an increase in the prices of 94 medicines by anywhere from 9% to 262%. These included medicines used for fever, headache, heart disease, malaria, diabetes, sore throat and flu.
According to sources, the federal government was forced to increase the prices due to various reasons including low availability in the market, appreciation of dollar and rising cost of raw materials.
The medicines whose prices have been increased also include antibiotics, abdominal pain, medicines for eye, ear, tooth, mouth and blood infection, skin diseases and post-childbirth drugs.
Of these, 68 medicines are local and 26 are imported. The price hike was report0edly unavoidable because of the aforementioned reasons. But, it is said that pharmaceutical companies will not be allowed to raise prices any further until June 2021.
