ABDA Bundesvgg. German pharmacist associations
Berlin (ots)
With the Medicines Supply Bottleneck Combating and Supply Improvement Act (ALBVVG) passed today by the Federal Cabinet, a great opportunity to secure and improve supply bottleneck management in pharmacies from the summer is missed. The draft resolution by Federal Minister of Health Prof. Karl Lauterbach still contains significant substantive deficiencies that the Bundesrat and Bundestag must now rectify as part of the legislative process so that Germany’s pharmacists can continue to guarantee consumer protection for millions of patients in the future.
“Supply bottlenecks in medicines will unfortunately be unavoidable in the foreseeable future and must therefore be managed efficiently in the pharmacies,” says Mathias Arnold, Vice President of ABDA – the Federal Union of German Pharmacists’ Associations: “The pharmacies need the freedom to make decisions and to be able to act when filling a prescription to hand over a replacement medication that is in stock instead of putting the patient off or sending it back to the doctor’s office for a new prescription. In short: the patients must be cared for quickly, unbureaucratically and safely. However, the cabinet draft for the Supply Bottleneck Act unfortunately still misses the opportunity to Secure drug supply in the long term.”
Arnold continues: “Unfortunately, the federal government is not solving the delivery problems with this law. Now the Bundestag has to make improvements. We don’t need two availability inquiries from the wholesaler if an alternative product is in stock in the pharmacy’s warehouse. As a bottleneck compensation for the personnel and time expenditure “We don’t need a two-digit cent amount, but a two-digit euro amount. We need reimbursement security so that the health insurance companies do not refuse to pay for the drug price and the pharmacy fee. And we need the option of producing recipes and defective products ourselves at any time, if not industrially Medicines can be delivered. One thing is clear in any case: We will shake up the health policy in Berlin with protests and actions. Save pharmacies to death? Not with us!”.
More information at www.abda.de
Press contact:
Christian Splett, deputy press spokesman, 030 40004-137, c.splett@abda.de
dr Ursula Sellerberg, deputy press officer, 030 40004-134, u.sellerberg@abda.de
Original content from: ABDA Bundesvgg. German pharmacist associations, transmitted by news aktuell