Cheap drugs remain elusive

The government has encouraged private pharmaceutical companies to make an effort to provide affordable medicines, currently much in demand due to the increased number of poor people resulting from the prolonged economic crisis.

"The problem of the accessibility of affordable medicines should be overcome immediately before it becomes more widespread and more complex," the head of the Medicine and Food Supervisory Agency, Sampurno, told a seminar on Saturday.

Sampurno said that over 60 percent of Indonesia's roughly 203 million people were now living under the poverty line and up to 20 percent of them were living in extreme property.

He said that Indonesia needed generic medicines, which were 40 percent cheaper than patented brands due to their negligible promotional and packaging costs.

Sampurno stressed that providing affordable medicines was one of the pharmaceutical companies' social and humanitarian functions.--JP