KAPI repond to Kenyatta’s directive

In a swift response to a public call by President Uhuru Kenyatta to international pharmaceutical firms, to reduce the cost of NCD medicines, KAPI, has confirmed ongoing efforts to affordably deliver essential medicines in Kenya.

The efforts are rolling out under a stakeholder initiative dubbed: Access Accelerated.

Alongside the initiative, the Association, comprising of leading international and local pharmaceutical firms, is also collaborating with the Ministry of Health to address non-tariff barriers affecting the pricing of medicines in the local market.

KAPI Chairperson, Anastasia Nyalita said the Association’s members have been undertaking public awareness programmes geared at educating Kenyans to exercise healthy living and preventive strategies as the most cost-effective measures against disease; especially lifestyle NCDs.

Speaking from New York, when he addressed a plenary session on the prevention and control of NCDs at the ongoing 73rd session on United Nations General Assembly in New York, last Thursday, President Kenyatta said access to essential medicines and technologies is key for effective management of NCDs.

The President said Kenya aims to guarantee access to quality NCD care through an integrated primary health care approach that emphasizes preventive and promotive health intervention that encourages the adoption of healthy lifestyles.

Additionally, said the Head of State, the government has committed itself to investing in additional and sustainable domestic financing to halt and reverse the burden of NCDs.

According to KAPI Chairperson, Anastasia Nyalita, the Association is playing a leading role in the local rollout of the global Access Accelerated initiative. Access Accelerated is a first-of-its-kind, multi-stakeholder collaboration focused on improving NCD care.

 

“KAPI, is working closely with the Ministry of Health among other stakeholders to address causative factors to the local cost of essential medicine and other pharmaceutical products, Dr Nyalita said. She added that, “Channel inefficiencies and excessive markup charges which contribute immensely to the unsustainable cost of medicine are currently under review.”

Launched at last year’s World Economic Forum in Davos Switzerland, Access Accelerated is an initiative spearheaded by twenty-two leading biopharmaceutical companies that have joined hands to advance the access to non-communicable (NCD) prevention and care agenda in low and lower-middle income countries including Kenya.

The ‘Access Accelerated’ programme, Nyalita said is already providing much needed impetus to facilitate sustainable NCD management.

Access Accelerated companies operating in Kenya include: Bayer, Bristol-Myers Eli Lilly and Company, GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson, Merck, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche and Sanofi, among others.

The goal of Access Accelerated, in partnership with the World Bank Group and the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC), is to work towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target to reduce premature deaths from NCDs by one-third by 2030.

In New York, President Kenyatta called on the international community to consider putting in place an incentive fund to stimulate the development of national NCD and mental health interventions and policy coherence for low and middle-income countries.

He said under the Big-4 pillar, Universal Healthcare has prioritized early diagnosis, screening and treatment of chronic NCDs.

Kenya continues to make tremendous progress in implementing the 22 political commitments agreed upon seven years ago aimed at a 25 per cent reduction in premature mortality occasioned by NCDs in 2025.

The President said Kenya’s success in this regard has been achieved through the domestication of the previous political declaration that adapted the global action plan for the prevention and control of NCDs in the national development blue print

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