ISLAMABAD, March 31: Every medicine registered under the 1976 Drug Act is a life-saving one, therefore, no drug should be subjected to General Sales Tax (GST), Islamabad Chemists and Druggists Association said.

The association representative, Arif Yar Khan, in a statement issued on Sunday, said exemption of life-saving drugs from the GST had created a great deal of confusion for the chemists and druggists all over the country.

An ordinary tablet for malaria “is a life-saving drug as its non-availability can endanger the life of any patient”, he said.

The prices of medicines are already too high due to several kinds of duties and direct or indirect taxes paid by the pharmaceutical companies to a retailer. In a poor country like Pakistan, where very few people can avail themselves of the medical facility, medicines should be subsidized, Mr Khan proposed.

He claimed that some pharmaceutical companies did not charge an additional amount of 15 per cent from the retailers soon after the imposition of the GST on medicines was announced. This amount should be refunded to the retailers without any delay, he stressed.

Meanwhile, Dr Israr Shah, former advisor to the prime minister on poultry and livestock, in a media conference, has claimed that the decision will cause a big loss to the poultry and livestock industry.

The industry, he said, was already faced with a great crisis, and the imposition of the GST on medicines for poultry and livestock would aggravate the situation.

An estimated Rs450 billion investment has been made in the sector, which gives an annual turn over of some Rs60 billion, Dr Shah said. The industry is the largest employment-generating sector after textile, as some 150,000 families are directly relying on it, he added.

He said around 400m chicken were bred every year, with breeders facing a Rs10 loss on each bird. During the past 15 months, the sector faced a Rs5 bn loss.