Bitter Pills:Medicines & The Third World Poor | Page 68

an enlightened policy by allowing their Bangladeshi subsidiaries to buy all raw
materials on the open market from the cheapest reliable sources. |94)
The US-based manufacturer, Squibb, buys only 12 of the 195 materials used locally
from Squibb sources. But it has imported raw materials at considerably higher
prices than other local manufacturers. For example, it paid almost twice as much
as Pfizer and over three times more than the locally-owned company K.D.H. to
import tetracycline.'951 The manager of Squibb Bangladesh explains: "We buy
them from our affiliates because we are guaranteed the materials will conform
in every particular to the exacting Squibb standards. It is strict adherence to these
quality standards and therefore product efficacy, that has made Squibb trusted
by the medical profession throughout the world and nowhere more than in
Bangladesh where we cannot risk wasting precious foreign exchange import licenses
on critical materials from outside vendors that may prove to be sub-standard and
therefore unusable." (%)
The Wellcome Foundation also cites the "stamp of Wellcome's quality control"
in explanation of the fact that trimethoprim was imported into Bangladesh on
its behalf at five times the price paid for this drug by the local manufacturer, Square
Pharmaceuticals. (97) Trimethoprim is one of the ingredients formulated into
Wellcome's brand name product Septrin in the factory of ICI Bangladesh, where
it takes up a sizeable part of production capacity. The high import price of the
raw material influenced the local Drug Administration's decision to hold down
the price of Septrin when a representative of Wellcome visited Bangladesh to try
to negotiate a price rise from Taka 2 to Taka 3.50 a tablet. (yS|
Similarly, ICI's local subsidiary paid five times more for a consignment of
levamisole than another local manufacturer and over twice the price Janssen of
Belgium (that originally invented and patented the drug) charged its local licensee,
Square. Wl The Chairman of ICI's Pharmaceuticals Division comments that the
price of Taka 5,400 per kiloCIF "referred to a single shipment of special grade
material manufactured exclusively to meet the special requirements of ICI
Bangladesh Manufacturers Ltd. (ICI BM). Since then we have been able to modify
the formulation of 'Ketrax' syrup and tablets so that ICI BM could use a simpler
starting material, and from February 1980 all supplies have been shipped at prices
in the range Taka 2,070 - Taka 3,130 depending principally on the exchange rate
applicable at the time."1""" ICI's Pharmaceuticals Chairman also points out that
"the question of fair pricing is examined by the office of the Drug
Controller". 110 " Indeed, according to the Director of Drug Administration at the
time, a written warning was sent to ICI telling them that the import price of
levamisole must be reduced. After some argument ICI agreed to drop the
price. " o:i
BPI, the joint-venture company managed under contract by May & Baker UK,
buys raw materials on the open market, but because of the conditons of a UK
Government tied-aid grant some raw materials have had to be bought at
uncompetitive prices through the Crown Agents in London.""1' BPI has imported
metronidazole at 5 times the price paid by other local manufacturers. "IU| Some
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