99 percent of Filipinos see medicines as expensive: survey

December 5, 2019

Nearly all Filipinos see medicines as expensive, according to a Pulse Asia survey released by the Department of Health (DOH) on Thursday.

According to the Ulat ng Bayan September report, ninety-nine percent of Filipinos do not buy all their prescription medicines due to its price.

"Public sentiment corroborates the results of another survey commissioned by the DOH that the Philippines is still paying far more than the international reference prices for branded and generic medicines," said Health Secretary Francisco Duque III in a statement.

Other reasons for respondents not buying their prescription medicines, based on the survey, are that medicines are not accessible (23 percent), there are no medicines in their place (16 percent), they had no time to buy the medicines (four percent), and that they did not need to take medicines (two percent).

The survey showed only two in every 3 (67 percent) of those surveyed admitted they are able to buy medicines when prescribed with five different drugs for a month’s use.

And of the 67 percent, 33 percent said they will be able to buy for less than a week; 26 percent for one week, and only four percent for 2-4 weeks.

When asked how much they were willing to spend for a month’s supply of medicines, 71 percent responded they can spend or are willing to spend less than P1,000; while 24 percent are willing to spend up to only P5,000.

The survey similarly showed  73 percent of respondents believe that the DOH and the pharmaceutical industry should work to lower drug prices at par with other countries.

Forty-nine percent respondents said they wanted to import cheaper generic medicines from other countries, while 42 percent wanted to impose fines on companies that illegally increase price of medicines.

The result of the survey comes amid the opposition of the Pharmaceutical Healthcare Association of the Philippines (PHAP) on the proposed imposition of the maximum drug retail prices on 122 selected medicines. DMS