ISLAMABAD: A private pharmaceutical company, AGP Limited, that last week imported the first shipment of 50,000 doses of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine to Pakistan said the government had not yet formally approved or announced a price cap.
In February, Pakistan said it would allow private companies to import coronavirus vaccines and agreed to exempt such imports from price caps, but last Thursday the health chief said that decision was being reversed and the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) would now recommend a price, which the cabinet would approve.
“We are in touch with the government regarding the vaccine price as it has yet to formally approve and announce a price tag for the imported Sputnik shots,” Umair Mukhtar, head of business planning and corporate affairs at AGP, told Arab News. “Once the pricing mechanism is finalized and per dose cost is approved and officially announced, we are in a position to procure and import sufficient doses for the public use. We haven’t been conveyed by the government so far about the official per dose vaccine price.”
The health ministry and Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) could not be reached for comment.
AGP’s comment comes amid Pakistani media reports that the government had fixed the maximum sale price of Sputnik V Russian vaccine at Rs8,449 ($54) for two doses.
China’s Sinopharm and CansinoBio, Sputnik-V and the British AstraZeneca vaccines are approved for emergency use in Pakistan, whose government has not secured any vaccine from manufacturing companies yet and is relying so far on donations.
The Russian vaccine that arrived in Karachi last Wednesday is the first private batch purchased and imported by a private company.
Dr. Rana Muhammad Safdar, director-general of health at the Ministry of National Health Services and Regulations, told Arab News last week that following a request from AGP Limited, a DRAP pricing committee had last Friday recommended the price tag for each dose of the vaccine and forwarded the recommendation to the federal cabinet for approval.
“DRAP has submitted a summary to fix price; that requires approval of the cabinet,” Safdar had said.
A DRAP notification seen by Arab News on Sunday recommended the vaccine’s landed cost plus a 40% markup as the price formula for imported vaccines. The maximum retail price would be calculated by “grossing up trade price to provide for retail discount at 15%,” according to the notification, while levies would not exceed 10% of “the cost of freight price by the importer.”