More than 34,000 Parkinson’s disease patients across the country are in danger of worsening or dying because the drug supply program to treat this pathology that was managing the national government was suspended until further notice, according to Eufracio Infante, president of the Caracas Civil Parkinson Association.
This is the free delivery of the Sinemet (Carvodopa-Levadopa), which has been done intermittently since 2017 in a private pharmacy chain and in Farmapatria.
Infante added that, although this medicine is not the only one that patients with this neurodegenerative pathology must take, it is very important for Venezuelan patients, especially those with low resources.
“Medicines to treat Parkinson’s disease are very expensive and those that arrive in Venezuela or are paid in foreign currency or at very high prices, which threatens the quality of life of the patients, who withdraw Sinemet at the facilities every month Pharmacy of Caracas “, intervened Aida Cabrera, vice president of the Association.
The medicine was delivered until October 2017 in a network of private pharmacies “and it worked very well. But at the end of the same year the program passes into the hands of Sefar (Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Service, attached to the Ministry of Health). After a few months, for 2018 it was suspended again. In 2019 it was reactivated and the Sinemet was regularly delivered to FarmaPatria at the headquarters of Panteón Avenue and the annex of the Pérez de León Hospital in Petare, and in recent weeks the pills had expired. Still, patients withdrew them, there was no choice. This week we found out that the program is suspended, we demand that the delivery be reactivated for the benefit of Parkinson’s disease patients, “emphasized Infante.
Delivery is in the city of Caracas. In the interior of the country the situation is more serious, they highlight. Relatives of patients must withdraw the medicine in the capital and send it to the states. Deliveries have been restricted due to transportation failures that have been generated by the arrival of Covid-19 in Venezuela.
This fight for access to medications that address this chronic and progressive neurodegenerative pathology has taken place on the streets throughout the country, “it is not a gift that the government gives us, it is a right established in the Constitution of the Republic, the right to health, ”said Infante.
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