Medication fair in Damascus to help boost pharmaceutical sector

As many as 46 pharmaceutical companies showcased a wide-range of medications and medical equipment at a five-day exhibition in Damascus.

With the Syrian crisis dragging on unabatedly, the aim of marketing these products is to boost the medical sector which lost millions of dollars throughout the crisis.

New products, such as drugs for lung and heart disease, were showcased, as well as alternatives to many kinds of medications, whose import has been brought to a halt due to Western sanctions on Syria.

Artificial body parts were also displayed, with companies claiming high quality products to help people who have suffered severe injuries and amputations.

"We used to have 93 pharmaceutical factories in Syria. As a result of the conflict, 19 factories went out of business," Minister of Health Nizar Yazagi told Xinhua Thursday during the fair, which opened Wednesday.

He said the remaining factories suffered a shortage in some medications in 2013, but in 2014 "we managed to overcome the shortage and continued working on new products to serve Syrian areas with locally manufactured medications."

"We cover between 70 and 80 percent of the local market needs of medicine and we plan to start manufacturing medication for chronic diseases, which we face difficulty in securing," he said.

Meanwhile, Muhannad Bairaqdar, a marketing manager at a pharmaceutical company, said the fair was very important for his company because it links pharmaceutical labs and medical cadres in Damascus.

"It's a very important fair for us to work with the medical cadres to showcase our products and give them an idea," he said.

Meanwhile, Bairaqdar noted there are a number of difficulties facing the pharmaceutical sector in Syria.

"We face the same difficulties all pharmaceutical factories face, such as securing and importing raw materials amid the current circumstances and the foreign sanctions on Syria. The second obstacle is securing enough hard currency to purchase necessary materials from abroad. The third hurdle is the difficulty in accessing some locations in Syria due to the ongoing conflict," he stated.

Anas Hussain, a pharmacist from Aleppo city, where most of the important medication factories are located, said he was lucky his factory is still running amid the ongoing battles there.

"We are taking part in this exhibition to display our products. Our factory is located in Aleppo city and thank God our business and production in Aleppo has not been affected by the raging war there. However, we face some snags, mainly safe roads to deliver our products to Damascus," he told Xinhua.

The European Union, along with the Arab League and the United States, imposed economic sanctions on Syria with the start of the conflict four years ago, to protest the clampdown on dissent by the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The sanctions have hit hard and brought almost all vital sectors in the country, including tourism and oil, to a standstill.

The Syrian government repeatedly intervened and subsidized prices of staple food items like sugar, rice and gasoline.

Prices of pharmaceuticals have remained relatively steady as they were heavily subsidized by the government, and Syria was one of the few countries that used to produce almost all of its medications. However, the ongoing crisis has affected this vital sector.

In January 2015, Ahd al-Deiry, head of the chemical industries office, placed the pharmaceutical sector losses in Syria at around 68 million U.S. dollars. Endit