Square Pharma sets up insulin manfcg unit

http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/more.php?news_id=98887&date=2010-04-29

Square Pharma sets up insulin manfcg unit
FE Report

Square Pharmaceuticals, the country’s largest medicine maker, has set up an insulin manufacturing unit in hopes to keep the highly expensive drug within patients’ purchasing capacity.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith inaugurated the state-of-the-art Insulin Manufacturing Unit at a ceremony at the Square’s production headquarters in Gazipur Wednesday.

Health Minister Prof AMF Ruhul Haque, health directorate secretary Sheikh Altab Ali, Square Group chairman Samson H Chowdhury and its managing director Tapan Chowdhury and diplomats of different countries were present on the occasion.

Spread over 36,000 square feet on the premises of Square Pharmaceuticals factory in Gazipur, the manufacturing facility cost Tk 900 million to be built.

The unit will manufacture insulin products using highly purified recombinant human insulin crystals in its formulation with different dosage types for covering a full spectrum of short, intermediate and long acting insulins.

The core objective of the unit – which has been built complying to US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) and European Medicine Agency Current Good Manufacturing Practice (EMEA cGMP) – is to make available a whole range of world-class insulin products at an affordable price for the people of Bangladesh, Tapan Chowdhury said later at a press briefing.

He said imports account for around 80 per cent of the country’s Tk 1.10 billion insulin products market. “Our unit will increase the share of local production by at least 10 per cent, thus reducing dependency on foreign imports to some extent.”

Also a former caretaker government adviser Tapan said the prices of the insulin drugs produced by his company would be available at 22 per cent lesser price than the imported products.

Square is also eyeing to export insulin products after meeting the local demand, said Mr Tapan adding that his company now exports medicines to 35 countries.

Health Minister Ruhul Haque said the number of diabetic patients in the country is increasing day by day. “But most of the insulin products are imported from abroad. So it is important to have domestic manufacturing facility to produce the life-saving drug at affordable prices.”