ISLAMABAD: Finance Minister Ishaq Dar emphasised on Monday that a pricing mechanism needs to be devised which ensures adequate supply of all essential drugs, protects interest of the customers while also taking cognisance of the requirements of the pharmaceutical industry.

Dar was chairing a meeting regarding the Drugs Pricing Policy to take all stakeholders on board including the Ministry of Finance for the formation of a balanced policy.

He said that suggestions of this meeting may be placed before the policy board for its consideration.

Secretary National Health Services briefed the minister about salient features of the draft policy, apprising him about various formulas for price fixing including cost plus pricing, reference pricing, market based pricing and freezing of prices at existing approved level.

The participants expre­ssed broad agreement on salient features of the policy.

Published in Dawn December 23th , 2014