Pharmacist Berna Yucel Mintas in her pharmacy in Ankara on December 13, 2021 (AFP / Adem ALTAN)
For weeks, Fatih Yüksel has been running pharmacies in Ankara. Like thousands of Turks, he is desperate to get his hands on drugs that disappeared from the market with the collapse of the Turkish lira.
“Sometimes I can’t find my medication at all and my condition gets worse. It’s very painful,” explains the 35-year-old man who has suffered from Behçet’s disease for nine years, a rare autoimmune disease characterized by severe headaches.
“It is then very difficult, but I have to continue working,” he adds.
The medical sector is one of the most seriously affected due to its dependence on imports as the national currency crumbles.
A whole range of drugs intended to treat diseases like diabetes, cancer or even a simple cold have become unavailable in the 27,000 pharmacies in Turkey.
The Turkish lira has lost more than half of its value since the start of the year against the dollar. It has even been in free fall since the declaration last month of a “war of economic independence” by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
In a pharmacy in Ankara, December 13, 2021 (AFP / Adem ALTAN)
Ignoring classic economic theories, the Turkish head of state requires the Central Bank to regularly lower interest rates, thus encouraging inflation that has exceeded 21% over the year.
On Friday, the exchange rate of 9.6 pounds in early November was close to 17 pounds to the dollar.
– “Denial of reality” –
“Turkey is going through a drug crisis. Many suppliers have withdrawn from the market because they were starting to lose money, the health ministry continuing to pay them with a dollar rate stopped at 4 pounds,” explains Vedat Bulut, General Secretary of the Union of Physicians of Turkey.
According to Bulut, more than 700 drugs are nowhere to be found and the list is growing day by day. But the Turkish authorities deny the existence of the crisis.
“The news evoking the shortage of drugs does not reflect reality”, hammered last week the Minister of Health Fahrettin Koca, accusing the pharmaceutical companies of trying to sell “expensive” their products.
Vedat Bulut, secretary general of the Turkish Medical Association, answers questions from AFP journalists in Ankara on December 13, 2021 (AFP / Adem ALTAN)
“It’s a denial of reality,” retorts Mr. Bulut, who explains that the same crisis also affects medical equipment, essential for surgical interventions. “Many operations are now suspended. The health of our citizens is in danger,” he warns.
– “Oil on the fire” –
Faced with the desperation of patients who seek them out to find drugs that cannot be found, pharmacists are calling on the government to reassess the price of drugs at least three times a year.
“The situation has deteriorated because of the fall of the Turkish lira. Imagine a fire on which we pour oil … This is what we are living”, explains Taner Ercanli, president. of the Ankara Order of Pharmacists.
But raising the prices of imported drugs today will not necessarily be enough.
The pandemic having caused an increase in the prices of raw materials, the treatments produced in Turkey are also affected.
Local producers therefore demand from the government that late payments take into account the current exchange rate and not the rate agreed at the time. Employers’ associations warn that some companies will have to go out of business if they do not manage to compensate for their losses.
– “Miserable situation” –
A customer buys drugs at a pharmacy in Ankara on December 13, 2021 (AFP / Archives / Adem ALTAN)
Medicines that cannot be found are sometimes the ones that were once so prevalent in the market, such as children’s cough syrups.
Emin Durmus, 62, had a bitter experience of this when he searched, unsuccessfully, for his 5-year-old grandson. “We are in a miserable situation. I hope those responsible hear us,” he laments.
Erkan Ozturk, who runs a health center in Ankara, also struggles with the lack of fever and nausea medication, or painkillers. “We are having serious difficulties finding injections to lower children’s fever,” he explains.
When the hospital support network is powerless to respond, it must administer oral medication or use cold compresses, which act more slowly than injections.
Pharmacist Gokhan Bulmus sees the crisis getting worse.
“We have fewer and fewer medicines for diabetes, hypertension, asthma or pneumonia,” he worries. “We are heading towards a general shortage. What remains today are the last drugs: afterwards, we will not be able to replace them,” he says.
© 2021 AFP
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