This action according to the Chamber of Pharmacy will affect clients who have not paid their debt since December last year.

The Chief Executive Officer of Ghana National Chamber of Pharmacy, Anthony Ameka explained that the debt is affecting their operations.

He stated that the NHIS has paid the health institution at least up to December last year and they are expecting these institutions to pay their debt.

“If you will remember some time ago we said we are no more going to credit to any institution, Ministry of Health came in and base on that we agreed to give some form of credit to some selected health facilities, for instance, those that are owing more than six months and we are told that NHIS has been able to pay up to December so any institution that is owing us we will not be able to give credit to such institutions again.”

“The most important thing among all this is that the burning of the medical store and this has led to the loss of jobs and also we are not able to pay for import and also manufacture some of the medicines needed in Ghana,” he added.

Last month the Chamber also hinted that the prices of pharmaceutical products will in the coming days go up due to challenges faced by importers in clearing their goods at the port.

The importers are now paying rent and demurrage charges after the delay in the implementation of the new system, UNIPASS.

Anthony Ameka said they have identified three main challenges since the implementation of UNIPASS.

According to him, these challenges are making it difficult for them to clear their goods at the port.

“Three main issues have been identified since the introduction of the UNIPASS, one has to do with the delay in the processing of the document, the second has to do with the reassessment by Customs after UNIPASS had approved the process. Then another challenge has to do with the request for re-registration fee by Ghana Standard Authority after registration the same product with Foods and Drugs Authority, the other challenge has to do with the delay caused at the airport leading to the situation where we have to pay huge demurrage at the end of the day.”

written by Samuel Kwame Boadu – Administrative Officer