Islamabad:
Heart patients in Pakistan are facing difficulties in their treatment as the important heparin injection for treating heart disease has died out, Pakistani media reported in the vernacular Daily Dunya.
The injection is used to thin the blood in heart patients. But there is a major shortage of this injection in government and private hospitals.
According to the sources, the price of this injection is 600 rupees, but it is sold on the black market for 3,000 rupees. Poor patients suffer greatly. Hospitals believe it is a false deficit, according to Daily Dunya.
The media recently reported that the ongoing economic crisis in Pakistan has hit the healthcare system hard, where patients struggle for essential medicines. The lack of foreign exchange reserves in the country has affected Pakistan’s capacity to import the required drugs or the active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) used in domestic production.
As a result, local pharmaceutical manufacturers have been forced to cut production while patients in hospitals suffer. Doctors are forced not to perform surgeries due to a shortage of medicines and medical equipment.
According to Pakistani media reports, operating rooms have less than the two-week supply of anesthesia needed for sensitive operations, including heart, cancer and kidney operations. The situation may also lead to job losses in hospitals in Pakistan, further compounding the misery of the people.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by DailyExpertNews staff and is being published from a syndicated feed.)