Drugs’ prices are skyrocketing

Today’s drugs are a little bit more expensive than yesterday’s ones on the local market. One capital city pharmacist blamed the price increase on the Ariary’s value drop. The situation is, however, a godsend for home based producers, whose products appear as so efficient with affordable prices, as well as for the dark side of the market. 

The Malagasy pharmaceutical industry is, for the time being, far from being large enough to satisfy home demands. The squeezing majority of drugstores’ articles are, consequently, made from abroad. Generic drugs are largely imported from India. 

In face of customers’ difficulties with drugstore based supply, a group of importers created a “parallel” market in some of Antananarivo city’s districts 10 years ago. The market is growing, and apparently immortal. In response to pharmacists’ complains, various regimes have been repeatedly straining to eradicate the smuggling in question, without much success.