What’s behind the medicine shortages in Germany? – DW – 10/13/2024 | EUROtoday

It solely prices a number of cents however it’s at the moment in brief provide: saline resolution has turn out to be a scarce commodity in German hospitals and pharmacies — but it’s urgently wanted for operations, and irrigation and infusion procedures. According to Thomas Preis, the top of the North Rhine Chamber of Pharmacists, the scenario has worsened dramatically in latest months.

“What has already been a major problem in hospitals for months is now also affecting the care of outpatients,” he warned the Düsseldorf-based newspaper Rhenish Post.

The North Rhine-Westphalian Ministry of Health confirmed that there have been provide bottlenecks. It stated that for a number of months “clinics in North Rhine-Westphalia and Germany had received only 80% of their needs” and lately this had fallen to round 50%. According to the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM), the scenario will proceed for months to return.

Shortages of antibiotics particularly

Germany has repeatedly been affected by shortages of medication, significantly antibiotics and kids’s medicines, lately. The penalties are extreme: a survey of members of the German Professional Association of Pediatricians (BVKJ) in spring 2024 discovered {that a} round a 3rd believed that the standard of remedy was in danger.

The survey additionally discovered that remedy was turning into extra time-consuming as a result of docs needed to test prematurely which medicines had been obtainable. According to the German Pharmacists’ Association (DAV) issues have already arisen for round 500 completely different prescribed drugs.

Other EU nations are additionally affected by shortages. According to a 2023 survey performed by the Pharmaceutical Group of the European Union (PGEU)the scenario has worsened in a number of member states, together with Sweden, Portugal and Spain.

Active components from China and India

The causes of the shortages are advanced, as is the manufacture of medication. Whereas Germany, which boasts giant pharmaceutical firms akin to Bayer, BASF, Boehringer Ingelheim and BioNTech, was as soon as thought to be the “pharmacy of the world,” manufacturing now takes place all around the world. Supply chains are longer and vulnerable to disruption.

The majority of energetic components are actually produced in China and India. Not solely are wages decrease there however environmental laws are much less stringent than within the EU. Mass manufacturing and monopolization have turn out to be the main target so as to make medicine extra cheaply. So, a smaller variety of suppliers are producing ever bigger portions.

“Whereas we used to have 10 suppliers of paracetamol syrup for fever, today there is only one main supplier left,” Professor David Francas, a provide chain knowledgeable on the Worms University of Applied Sciences, defined to DW.

“We are, therefore, dependent on just a few manufacturers. And if one of them gets stuck, then the whole supply chain gets stuck,” stated Professor Ulrike Holzgrabe, an knowledgeable in pharmaceutical and medicinal chemistry on the University of Würzburg.

“If there are small disasters on the supply route, such as a closed harbor in Shanghai during the COVID-19 pandemic or a ship blocking the Suez Canal, then the goods don’t get to us,” she advised DW.

Just-in-time manufacturing doesn’t assist

Limited shares and just-in-time manufacturing solely exacerbate the issue when momentary shortages within the manufacturing chain can’t be compensated. But consultants imagine that restocking is pricey. Storage amenities value cash and it’s by no means sure whether or not saved medicines will really be offered.

Fluctuations in demand are monumental: in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, for instance, demand at Infectopharm collapsed as a result of the widespread carrying of masks led to a pointy decline in a number of different infectious illnesses. The firm needed to destroy costly antibiotic juices for kids as a result of it was unable to promote them. Two years later, demand soared once more.

The worth downside is especially acute with generics, which account for 70 to 80% of the essential provide of prescribed drugs. “The margins for manufacturing such products are extremely low,” stated Holzgrabe. Manufacturers are pressured to supply as cheaply as attainable by low cost agreements and different offers that had been launched into the German healthcare system years in the past.

Though many have referred to as for this, it will be troublesome to deliver manufacturing again to the EU utterly. One motive is that it will be difficult to supply the fantastic chemical substances wanted for energetic components. “We have created environmental legislation that makes this almost impossible,” stated Holzgrabe.

Even if it had been attainable, it will not present an answer for this coming winter. “It takes at least five years to re-establish production facilities,” stated Francas.

This article was translated from German.