PAHO and ECLAC seek to improve the supply of medical products during emergencies in Latin America and the Caribbean

With the aim of preventing interruptions in medical product supplies during future health emergencies, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) convened a dialogue between the health, industry, and science and technology sectors in the region.

“The scarcity of medical products can cause disruptions in health care and put health and life at risk,” said PAHO Director Dr. Carissa F. Etienne. “That’s why it’s a priority for health, science, and technology, and industry to work together to ensure equitable access to medicines and other essential technologies not only in peacetime but also during future emergencies,” she said.

Alicia Bárcena, Executive Secretary of ECLAC, stressed that “the health industry is a strategic sector and we are challenged to combine its social objectives of meeting the health needs of the population with its regional economic development possibilities. Integrated health, science and technology, and industrial policies guided by this challenge and mission, and under a public-private partnership, are essential to this.”

The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated structural weaknesses in health systems in the region and the basis for rethinking development, as well as the vulnerability of global supply chains, with import restrictions and insufficient availability of medical products and health technologies to meet large increases in demand.

In addition, the region has a health manufacturing industry which, with some exceptions, is not well developed and has low levels of technological sophistication, leading to high dependence on external products; according to ECLAC estimates, only 4% of imports of medical products related to the response to COVID-19 in Latin America and the Caribbean originated in the region itself.

PAHO and ECLAC agreed on the need for a renewed vision of comprehensive policies, which considers the objectives and needs of the health sector and encourages industrial development in the sector.

The challenge is to move towards an integrated regional market for medicines and other health technologies, based on country-shared research and production networks. If the necessary scale is reached, this market could reduce external dependence and ensure access to the medical products needed to meet regional demand.

Original source: PAHO