The chairman of the Food and Drug Administration of Iran said that domestically-produced drugs with the least possible foreign currency (about 600 to 700 million dollars) is supplying major foreign currency the country is needed.

Iran Press/Iran: Mehdi Pirsalehi stressed that if there was no domestic production, it might not have been possible to manage the pharmaceutical market by 10 times of the amount of money. 

Pirsalehi said on Saturday at the ceremony of the pharmaceutical industry empowerment on the 40th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution in Tehran at the Olympic Hotel in Tehran that the pharmaceutical industry in Iran is one of the industries that has been succeeded by strives of managers, IRNA reported.

At the beginning of the revolution, the industries only provided 25 percent of the country's needs, and the rest were the imported pharmaceutical products. During the war, new pharmaceutical factories have been established, marked as one of the honors of the country. Also, many drug items have been researched by these companies each year and entered the drug market of the country, the official noted.

2018 was one of the hardest years in the country's pharmaceutical industry, but despite all the hardships and problems that it has, the least deficiency has been due to domestic drugs, he said. That is, pharmaceutical companies were active with all the sanctions' problems. This shows that if we do not strengthen the domestic pharmaceutical industry, we will be in difficult circumstances and sanctions, he added.

The deputy health minister said that the next year may be a difficult year for the pharmaceutical industry, but the domestic power of the country can make us succeed, pharmaceutical companies have worked well to supply items, and we hope that according to reports we have the least deficiencies in medicine for at least the first 6 months of the next year. 101/202