Kathmandu, July 7

Department of Drug Administration is preparing to reduce prices of drugs available in the market.

DDA Director Narayan Dhakal, DDA is preparing to reduce prices of drugs to increase impoverished citizens’ access to health services.

He said that the government was planning to reduce the prices of drugs keeping in mind that people had to spend huge amount of money on medicines alone and the poor had to sell their property for treatment and drugs.

He said the DDA would collect suggestion for the same till the month of Shrawan and soon after that it would table a bill in the Parliament.

Dhakal said that due to lack of  proper policy in place pharmaceutical companies had been cheating people and same drug was being sold at different prices by different companies.

DDA is also planning to introduce a provision for pharmaceutical companies as per which they will not be able to keep a profit margin of more than 100 per cent. And the companies that import medicines from outside the country could only keep 50 per cent profit margin.