Consumer woes are mounting as price of drugs have risen astronomically on the back of dollar scarcity that has hindered suppliers from bringing in the products.
Drugs are gradually disappearing from shelves and replenishing stock of inventories has become an uphill task thereby increasing the risk with falling ill in a country where medical services are thought to be abysmal.
Angela Odor, 32, a sales representative at Jay Kay pharmaceuticals, the largest drug stores in the port city Apapa Lagos, says it has not been easy getting supplies from manufacturers.
“As you can see, the shelves are empty. Our suppliers say there are no dollars to import drugs. Customers are forced to buy the little ones we have at an outrageous price and a lot of them are disgruntled,” said Odor.
Odor added that the company has deployed a strategy whereby they sell in bits since most people can’t afford to buy drugs because it has become so expensive.
“A particular drug we sold three months ago for N4000 is now goes for N10000. The ones that should be N2300 now sell for N4990, an increase of about 50 percent,” said Odor.
Except water, 95 percent of raw materials used in the manufacture of drugs are imported. The unfortunate situation has fuelled the influx of cheap and substandard products into the country.
Nigeria is struggling with a 40 percent drop in the price of oil since 2014 that caused a severe dollar shortage. Consequently, manufacturers are forced to buy dollars from the inaccessible parallel market.
While the central bank has adopted a flexible exchange rate policy that saw the naira lose 40 percent of its value against the US currency, manufacturers still bemoan dollar scarcity.
The economic downturn has shown face in the numbers of pharmaceutical firms quoted on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) as they faltered while stocks were beaten down.
A cursory look at the financial statements of 3 dominant players in the industry for the nine months through September showed Union Diagnostic and Clinical Services, Pharma Deko Plc and Evans Phamarceutical Plc recording losses of N326.16 million, N110.29 million and N722.06 million respectively.
Fidson Healthcare Plc, May and Baker Pharmaceutical, Evans pharmaceutical, Neimeth Pharmaceutical, Pharma Deko, Union Diagnostic, returned -42.90 percent, -18.18 percent, nil, -25.84 percent -20.89 percent and nil respectively, compared to +0.56 percent return for the NSE –ASI in the same period.
For Odor drug makers must have access to dollars to import drugs to meet the demand of teeming population otherwise Nigerian will wake up one morning and find out drugs have vanished from shelves and that is calamitous for the country.