Medical equipment imports hit snags

Industry representatives see regulations, forex shortage stifling supplies

KARACHI:

Smooth import of medical and surgical equipment has gotten entangled in regulatory red tape besides shortage of dollars in the country, said industry representatives on Tuesday.

Skewed policies of the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) have disrupted the supply of medical equipment across the country, raising fears of delays in life-saving surgeries, said Healthcare Devices Association of Pakistan (HDAP).

The association has expressed apprehensions of a serious crisis in the provision of medical facilities due to the problems faced in the import of medical and surgical equipment and machinery in the country.

It said that DRAP has made registration of medical devices mandatory. After the decision, import policy was made subject to DRAP certificate. DRAP has not been able to make a decision on most of registration applications submitted over the years, thus choking the smooth import of the equipment.

So far, applications for the import of around 3,000 applications have been approved, although the number of medical devices used in Pakistan is more than 100,000.

HDAP said that the list of medical and surgical devices and equipment is almost endless with devices used in pathological laboratories, minor and major surgeries of all sorts like orthopaedic, cardiac, renal, brain and such.

HDAP Senior Vice Chairman Adnan Siddiqui said that 90-95 per cent of medical equipment and medical devices in Pakistan are imported from foreign countries.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, January 4^th, 2023.