East African Business Week

Kampala, Uganda-Local pharmacists in the country have partly slashed drug prices following GlaxoSmith Kline's (GSK) declaration of a 50 % price reduction on its drugs. However the reduction does not rhyme with GSK's declaration.
Many have attributed the small reduction to the large stock of GSK products that was purchased at higher prices before the reduction and claim to have embarked on the move to reduce the prices.
GSK, based in the United Kingdom and with a strong presence in East Africa, recently slashed the prices of all its antibiotics, dewormers and asthma drugs, by half, and urged all drug stores and pharmacists to follow suit.
Drugs such as Amoxil, Bactroban, Zentel and Ventolin that alleviate conditions of cough, asthma, and other chronic diseases faced the price cut. Mr. Bernard Bainomuhwezi, a pharmacist at Plus Medic Pharmacy in Wandegeya a Kampala suburb, has reduced the prices though not to the expected levels.
"Reducing prices is a long process that involves monitoring the general drug prices in other pharmacies as well as considering the cost of production," said Bainomuhwezi.
 "Amoxil cost Ushs 15000 (US $ 5.7) before the slash and the indication of the price cut is the current cost of Ushs 11,000 (US $ 4.2) at Plus Medic," explained Bainomuhwezi.
Other drugs include Bactroban and ventolin whose prices reduced by Ushs 3000 ( $ 1.1) and Ushs 4000 ( $ 1.5) at Plus Medic.
Mr. Steven Zirintuusa of Surgipharm Uganda limited, one of the distributors of GSK products in the country, says that they have completed that task of distributing the new price lists.
"It is only left in the hands of the pharmacisists and drug sellers to put into practice the new quotations because the drugs are distributed at a reduced price," said Zirintuusa.
GSK's country manager Nathan Wasolo announced compensation for pharmacists to implement the resolution.
"We have a policy of checking competitor's prices therefore we cannot reduce by half yet our counterparts reduced by quarter," said a pharmacist at First pharmacy who declined to be known.
Seretide and Zinnat cost Ushs 70,000 ( $ 26.9) and Ushs 38,000 ( $ 14.6) before the price cut but has now reduced to Ushs 60,000 ( $ 23.1) and Ushs 30,000 ( $ 11.5) respectively at First pharmacy.
This leaves GSK with a task ahead of the resolution to make a follow up especially on the drug dealers who have totally refused to implement the price cut.