Guideline to guarantee supply of medicines

The General Office of the State Council issued a guideline on Friday aimed at ensuring sufficient stocks of medicines that tend to be in short supply and stabilizing their prices.

Ministries and provinces should work together to set up a multisource information platform and a monitoring system that can be used to share information on the production of medicines and their prices.

There should be a national list of medicines in short supply, and all provinces should have their own such lists.

The National Health Commission and the National Medical Products Administration should design a system to manage the lists.

Local authorities should improve the management of medicines on their lists and, at the same time, avoid excessive interference in their pricing, according to the guidelines.

Health insurance regulatory authorities should monitor medicine prices and issue alarms when prices surge abnormally and take effective measures to curb such price hikes.

The authorities should also punish those seeking to monopolize medicine production and the supply of drug ingredients strictly and according to law.

The central and local governments should enhance their stocks of medicines and encourage large pharmaceutical companies to build up stocks of medicines that could be released when shortages occur.

The causes of medicine shortages vary, but they include monopolies in production and the increasing cost of ingredients.