Of the 17 key markets surveyed in BMI’s Pharmaceuticals & Healthcare Business Environment Ratings, Bangladesh moves down one place to occupy 15th position in the Q410 update of the table. This adjustment now sees Bangladesh placed above Pakistan and Cambodia, the latter being judged the least attractive proposition for investment by multinational pharmaceutical companies. Bangladesh’s pharmaceutical rating is 39.7, a figure that has changed marginally from the previous quarter and which remains lower than the regional average of 52.3. Nevertheless, BMI expects Bangladesh’s position to improve over the medium term as a result of rising population numbers, economic improvements and efforts made by domestic firms to expand both their product portfolios and overseas markets. Sales of prescription drugs and over-the-counter (OTC) medications are expected to grow from BDT79.74bn (US$1.16bn) in 2009 to BDT268.42bn (US$3.74bn) in 2019, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.37%.
It is estimated that US$150mn worth of spurious drugs currently pose a risk to public health in Bangladesh. In its annual testing of 5,000 drug samples in 2010, the Public Health and Drug Testing Laboratory detected 300 drugs that are either counterfeit or of very poor quality. More significantly, these included many popular antibiotics and lifesaving medications. Preliminary findings have revealed that Bangladesh has as many as 80,000 unlicensed pharmacies in operation throughout the country. It is thought that these counterfeit products are produced in numerous drug factories situated along the Bangladeshi, Indian, Pakistani, Chinese and Thailand borders.
Findings published by health experts and physicians suggest that over 10mn people are thought to be infected by the Hepatitis B or C virus in Bangladesh. The data has also revealed that the number of patients contracting the Hepatitis B virus in the country has been increasing each year. It is also thought that about 1.2% to 3.5% of pregnant women in Bangladesh carry the Hepatitis B virus, all of whom have the potential to transmit the disease during the birthing process.
In other developments, French pharmaceutical major Sanofi-Aventis, one of the largest multinational pharmaceutical companies operating in Bangladesh, announced that it had decided to provide its revolutionary anti-cancer drug Taxotere (docetaxel) at an affordable price as a part of the company’s Patient Assistance Programme. The programme has been introduced to enable cancer patients to gain better access to treatments through chemotherapy.
Elsewhere, leading domestic pharmaceutical manufacturer Beximco announced that it was in talks with major Western pharmaceutical companies about manufacturing their products under licence at its facilities in Bangladesh. The company has so far held talks with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Novartis and Watson Pharmaceuticals Inc. about manufacturing medicines under licence for sale in developing markets and possibly in the West. Beximco already manufactures some leading products under licence, such as GSK’s asthma medication, Ventolin. Beximco also reported a 21% y-o-y increase in revenue of BDT4.87bn (US$70mn) in 2009, which was driven largely by exports and the introduction of new products.
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