Medicines are an unhealed wound for Albanians. And not only for prices, but also for their quality. Not to mention some pharmaceutical companies that are often at the center of the black chronicle. The solution has never come from the Ministry of Health, even though the new minister, in the guise of a "specialist", holds round tables with NGOs to find a solution to a problem that has its origins precisely in political interests. If you ask every Albanian who enters and exits pharmacies today, the concerns are almost identical: medicines are expensive, while those that cost less and are reimbursable, have no effect.
In this grim reality, the Ministry of Health seems to continue to organize meetings with a “cooperative tone” and statements for reforming the pharmaceutical system. Minister of Health Evis Sala, held a meeting with the Pharmaceutical Business Union, where she emphasized the need for “joint commitment to guaranteeing safe and controlled access to medicines.”
According to her, the establishment of a working group will analyze and improve the pharmaceutical sector to strengthen the quality of service to patients. Sala spoke of "a transparent and predictable environment", "equal business partners" and "zero tolerance for abusers".
But while the minister talks about transparency and cooperation, citizens are faced every day with drugs that change name, packaging, origin – and often without any medical effect. While pharmacies continue to be an arena of price abuses, pharmaceutical imports and the network of companies that dominate the market remain outside any real institutional control.
The meeting with the Pharmaceutical Business Union, a day after the one with the Association of Pharmaceutical Representatives, does not differ much from the promises that have been made for years. They are the same words that Albanians hear every time a minister changes, while the medicines - which are supposed to cure - continue to be another wound of the system that does not know or does not go deep enough to cure the cause.
