Poor planning and price centric approach has started causing shortage of vaccines, anti-rabies being the recent case, it has been learnt. Since most vaccines are imported in finished form, any supply disruptions can impact its availability to the patients. Most of these vaccines are biological and have specialized nature of manufacturing and there are few manufacturers around the world that cater to the global demand for the same, sources said.
The government issues a tender of one million anti rabies vaccines to cater public need every year, however, only around 300,000 were sourced due to high global demand and manufacturers put Pakistan on low priority due to irrational pricing policy. This shortage may lead to a serious health crisis in Pakistan and many patients may terribly suffer, the sources claimed.
It may be noted that rabies kills around 60,000 people a year and is present in more than 150 countries, but is considered a neglected disease mainly affecting the rural poor.
Recent reports suggest that cases of dog bites are on the rise and in the city of Karachi alone; more than 150 dog bite cases a day are reported. Independent healthcare professionals estimate shortage of at least 800,000 doses of vaccine required by dog bite victims.
"Not only rabies, there has been a shortage of vaccines in Pakistan for preventable and treatable diseases such as MMR for children, as a huge quantity of most of the vaccines are not being manufactured in Pakistan," said a health expert.
"Regulatory and pricing regime in the country does not encourage companies to put forward business cases for ensuring continuous supply during high demand period," said the expert.
"The government needs to encourage local manufacturers to produce these vaccines so that the country can at least meet the demand to avoid health crisis," he asserted.
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