Ghana Chamber of Pharmacy to suspend supplies to hospitals

The Ghana Chamber of Pharmacy (GCP) intends to suspend the supply of medicines to hospitals under the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) across the country with effect from February 10, 2014.

This is due to failure  of such service providers to pay the distributors for medicines supplied.

This was contained in a press release signed by Mr Stanley Adjei, Head, Research and Advocacy of the chamber, and issued in Accra.

The release said while some hospitals were in arrears since July, 2013, others had defaulted payment since May, 2013.

It noted that the delay in the disbursement by the National Health Insurance Authority was impacting negatively on the financial strength and survival of the distributors.

According to the release, members of the chamber had to resort to borrowing from the banks at 30 per cent interest rates and sometimes from microfinance institutions at interest rates of five per cent per month in order to bridge the funding gap and sustain supplies to the hospitals.

It noted further that the cedi had suffered intense depreciation against the major international trading currencies since the last half of 2013.