Tamlyn Stewart: The Times,
WOMEN will have to pay more than expected for the new cervical cancer vaccine, Cervarix, as pharmacies tack on as yet uncapped "dispensing fees".
Dispensing fees are still discretionary. The Department of Health introduced laws three years ago to limit the mark-ups pharmacists were allowed to charge on medicines - R26 for prescription medicines, and R16 for nonprescription medicines.
Pharmacists argued that these amounts were too low and the limits have been suspended until the legal challenge to them is decided.
The head of corporate communications for the Board of Healthcare Funders, Heidi Kruger, said: "We are concerned that the constructive legislation the government brought in to bring down the cost of medicines is not being seen by consumers because there is no clarity on pharmacists' professional fees."
Johan Bothma, national executive director of the community pharmacy sector of the Pharmaceutical Society of SA, said it was "not fair" to pharmacists for manufacturers to advertise their single-exit price - the maximum price they are allowed to charge - because it created expectations among consumers.
"Obviously, [consumers] will be charged more [than the manufacturer's single-exit price by the retailer]," said Bothma.
The medical director of drugs company GlaxoSmithKline, Dr Navin Singh, confirmed that the single exit price of the Cervarix vaccine was R700 an injection.
The vaccine is administered in a series of three injections.
Wynberg Pharmacy, in Cape Town, quoted R864 for an injection and Dischem, at Cresta shopping centre, in Johannesburg, said it would charge R827.60.
The Cancer Association of SA has called on the Department of Health to make the new cervical cancer vaccine freely available to the public.
The Medicines Control Council recently gave GlaxoSmithKline the go-ahead to distribute its cervical cancer vaccine in South Africa.
Rose Jacobs, head of health programmes for the association, told THE TIMES it "should be obligatory that all children in the schooling system complete the inoculation programme, which should include the cervical cancer vaccine". The sooner a child is vaccinated, the better, and 10 years would be an appropriate age, said Jacobs "because children are exposed to sexual activity while young."
She said the vaccine should be made available free to adults at clinics and by gynaecologists.
Department of Health spokesman Sibani Mngadi said the department would first have to determine the subtype of the human papilloma virus (HPV) prevalent in South Africa. This would indicate how effective the vaccine was likely to be in widespread treatment. Only then could the department consider making the drug freely available.
HPV, a common sexually transmitted infection in South Africa, is the cause of most cervical cancers.