Healthy Skepticism Library item: 17035
Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.
 
Publication type: Journal Article
Bland B
Indonesian doctors are told to prescribe generics to reduce health costs
BMJ 2009 Jan 20;
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/340/jan20_2/c349
Abstract:
Government doctors in Indonesia will soon be required to prescribe generic drugs where possible in a bid to drive down the spiralling costs of providing health care in the world’s fourth most populous nation.
Officials from the health ministry said that doctors working in state hospitals and clinics would be able to prescribe more expensive branded drugs only if no generic equivalents were available.
Although a decree requiring doctors to use generic drugs was implemented in 1989 it has never been properly enforced. Many doctors, who are paid less than many other civil servants, have continued to prescribe branded drugs because of the kickbacks they receive from drug salespeople.
The health minister, Endang Rahayu Sedyaningsih, who took up office in October, said that she was determined to stop this practice and that she was finalising a new ministerial decree to ensure that the use of generics becomes widespread.
“We will . . .