Medicine shortage not due to panic buying, says Khairy

ALOR SETAR: The short supply of medicines especially at certain pharmacies and private health facilities is not due to panic buying by the public, says Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin.

Instead, he said this was due to the high demand for certain medications following the spread of the Omicron variant of Covid-19 earlier and the rising cases of hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) now.

ALSO READ: A healthy supply of meds

However, Khairy said the situation was not nationwide as it only involved several locations and certain medicines, and he assured the public that the supply of medicines in the country was adequate.

"Many of the medications were said to be in short supply but have not run out of stock and they are for common illnesses such as flu, fever, headache and so on.

ALSO READ: Ample supply of medicine at govt health facilities, says KJ

"So maybe this is related to the time when many were infected with Covid-19 and after that HFMD spiked the demand for such medicines,” he said in a media conference here on Thursday (June 9).

Khairy said the Health Ministry was conducting a review with medicine manufacturers and importers to obtain detailed information on the supply of such medications apart from obtaining feedback from the Malaysian Medical Association as well as private clinics.

ALSO READ: Ample supply of life-saving drugs

“We will work with pharmaceutical companies on whether to provide alternative medicines or to import medicines from other countries.

"But now we are receiving several complaints daily and we will try to assist them to obtain stocks of the medicines. Government facilities do not have such problems,” he said.

Earlier, Khairy attended the presentation of medical equipment from the government of Japan through the Japan Grant Aid to the Health Ministry which was attended by Japanese Ambassador to Malaysia Takahashi Katsuhiko.

On the contribution, Khairy said the medical equipment worth RM19.3mil would be distributed to all government hospitals in the country to improve services at those facilities.

"Many hospitals would be receiving the equipment and they include Hospital Kuala Lipis, Hospital Kuala Krai, Hospital Orang Asli Gombak and Hospital Jempol," he said.

In December 2020, Japan offered to help Malaysia combat Covid-19 with Japan Grant Aid to supply critical medical equipment for the treatment of patients.

To date, 174 of the 248 units of equipment had been distributed to government hospitals nationwide and the equipment including syringe pumps, emergency carts, blood gas analyzers, portable ultrasound scanners and defibrillators will continue to be used to treat non-Covid-19 patients when the outbreak is declared over. – Bernama