ISLAMABAD, March 10: The Health Ministry on Thursday decided to set up three drug-testing laboratories, approved by the Unites States’ Federal Drug Authority, at the federal capital, Punjab and Sindh.

The decision to this effect was taken at a high-level meeting on development and standardization of hospital formulary, procurement procedures and development of national generic drug list.

Presided over by Health Minister Mohammad Nasir Khan, the meeting discussed matters relating to compilation of a common list of essential drugs for hospital formulary, common pre-qualification criteria for bulk purchase, enforcement of green-colour scheme, improvement in drugs quality and availability of medicines on cheaper rates.

The minister called for evolving a common list of generic and brand drugs, and critical pre-qualification criteria for public purchases. This, he said, was the immediate requirement of national health care services in terms of manufacturing, registration and quality control, ultimately facilitating WTO patent rights at affordable pricing.

He also stressed the need for adopting a uniform policy for procurement of medicines for public hospitals at provincial and federal level.

The meeting decided to formulate a high-level committee to develop common generic formulary for bulk purchases at all health establishments at federal and provincial level. The committee has been asked to come up with recommendations to reduce unnecessary drug/anti-biotic use and establish a common price index.

The committee comprises representatives from provincial health departments (one each), one nominee each from provincial teaching hospitals, representatives of armed forces medical services and members of Drugs Control Organization, Ministry of Health.

It was decided in the meeting to reduce renewal period of drug manufacturing licence from five years to three years to bring about improvement at the manufacturing units and to ensure availability of quality drugs to the public.

The meeting observed that the district nazims allocated very small budget for district health institutions.