Press Review of the week
July 4th 2011
UAE Ministry of Health announced a drop in generic drugs prices to reduce fake medicines market, according to GuflNews. “At least ten per cent of fake drugs found in Europe pass through Dubai (…). The other ports where the drugs are re-shipped to Europe are the free zone port in Jordan and some ports in Egypt.”
In East Africa, where counterfeiting medicines are important due to poverty and diseases like malaria and AIDS, last week in Nairobi, the largest pharmaceutical companies have gathered, owing to American Voice, to “develop a strategy to fight counterfeit medicines”. In GulfTimes, we read that in Qatar the Supreme Council of Health’s Pharmacy and Drug Control Department (PDCD) is reinforcing the current law to fight against fake drugs sales and their complex distribution networks.
The New York Times remind us the scandal of corruption that damaged the new Government in Jordan (including the Health Ministry), whereas the public doctors strike has been suspended…
“Anyone who thinks that this quiet means the end of protests is mistaken. Reform in the minds of most Jordanians is fighting corruption. The palace needs to promote a tsunami of change in words, politics and personnel.”
Amer Sabayleh, a professor of political science at the University of Jordan (in The New York Times article)
Ibrahim Saif in The Los Angeles Times underlines that there is a real need for transparency in social expenditures and for good governance for approaching social justice. “Social expenditure is often used for political ends. The ruling regimes direct spending to purchase political loyalty based on geography or demography, regardless of whether beneficiaries need the help. (…) The money currently being spent, however, is not achieving its goals, and continuing with the same model is not sustainable. (…) Much more can be done to improve the management of such spending, so that citizens can judge the effectiveness of the new regimes.”
The new governments have to change their model and pursue the reforms to transparency and citizen participation.
