Bangladesh gifted 2.2 million US dollars’ worth of medical supplies to Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka’s government information department said.
The donation was handed over by Bangladesh High Commissioner Tareq Md Ariful Islam to Sri Lanka Minister of Health Keheliya Rambukwella.
Due to forex shortages and the collapse of the rupee, Sri Lanka is currently facing a severe drug shortage in the country with 76 essential medicines still being out of stock to distribute within the health industry.
Due to the drug shortage, many government hospitals have postponed or limited their routine surgeries in order to save available stocks of medicine for emergency purposes.
The government statement said the donation consists of 79 essential medications including anti-cancer, anti-hypertensive, antibiotic oral and injectables, anti-viral, anti-epileptic and anti-asthmatic medication.
Earlier two consignments of medicine were donated by India and France.
Sri Lanka is facing drug shortages after money printing led to a currency collapse and forex shortages, analysts say.
Suppliers had also blamed the price controls of the National Medical Regulatory Authority (NMRA) for shortages.
Sri Lanka has an intermediate regime central bank which the economists in the country misuse to print money to boost growth (monetary stimulus or output gap targeting) and trigger currency crises.
