By Own Correspondent| Government is working on fixing the shortage of essential drugs and medicines through engaging countries such as India for possible government to government arrangements, President Emmerson Mnangagwa has said.

Writing in his weekly column in the Sunday Mail, Mnangagwa said:

“This week we will host the Vice-President of India. India is a key drug supplier to us. Government hopes to take full advantage of this fraternal visit to explore possibilities on pharmaceutical supplies on the back of government-to-government arrangements.

Likewise, we will engage other governments with supply capacity at good value for money. Our scope of engagement with friendly governments will go beyond drug imports…We will explore ways to reboot our capacity for the local production of essential drugs as before.

In the immediate and interim, we must use our national drug store facility, NatPharm, which is the least encumbered, as our vehicle for placing fresh orders for medicines, while we tackle the legacy debt.

Where foreign drug suppliers have local agents who may be incapacitated to import for reasons already cited, some arrangements may have to be reached with NatPharm so we move speedily to plug the import gap.”-StateMedia