Its president Lovy Beh said the special committee, comprising representatives of MCPG and other stakeholders, could work together with the health ministry to ensure a fair mechanism was put in place.
She said in a statement that the mechanism would only be fair if everyone started from the same cost price/base.
Otherwise, she said, many community pharmacies would close shop as most of them were already “throwing price or selling cheap in the market”.
If the government was moving towards a national healthcare financing scheme, she said, it needed to be more transparent and to also engage MCPG and the private sector.
She warned that it would “be disastrous” if the mechanism was implemented without input from the private sector.
Beh was responding to remarks by Health Minister Dzulkefly Ahmad in the Dewan Rakyat, and reported by FMT, that the government was in the early stages of coming up with a proposal on implementing a mechanism to control the prices of drugs through existing laws such as the Price Control Act and the Anti-Profiteering Act 2011.
Among other things, Dzulkefly said, “I understand the differences in prices at pharmaceutical outlets, dispensaries, and specifically in private hospitals, because the problem of prices being marked up is happening without any control.”
To this, Beh said: “We wish to state that most community pharmacists are selling medicines at costs or lower than costs price at their own costs, so, there should not be any generalisation of the situation. On top of that, there must be a reasonable mark-up fee for business owners or pharmacists to survive.”
Beh said the MCPG, which represents community pharmacists and whose members are also business owners, would be able to provide insightful assistance to the ministry.
“In this regard, MCPG would like to propose to the ministry of health to set up a special committee comprising of representatives of MCPG and other relevant stakeholders.
“This committee will then work closely with the ministry to ensure that implementation is well carried out for the benefit of all stakeholders. This committee could also work closely with Bahagian Farmasi (the ministry’s pharmaceutical division) in creating and carrying out the price control mechanism.
“With regards to the medicine price standardisation, there are various efforts that have to be in place to ensure that the process covers as wide concerns as possible.”
She said currently the government, private sector, general practitioners, and pharmacists were buying medicines at different cost prices due to bulk purchases or price differentiation.
“We are of the view that the first step to move in is by setting standardised base costs across all channels with reasonable mark-up fee for business owners or pharmacists to survive. In deciding on the price, there are also various factors to consider including administrative and operational costs in running a business.”