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Farmers
flung in the mud The price of
paddy has dropped from Rs. 13 a kilo to Rs. 11. When the price
was Rs. 13 , farmers had deposited their paddy in stores, with a
view to selling it at a later date when the price increased. But
the drop in prices has now left the farmers helpless and unable
to pay the interest on their loans. Elahera Farmers
Society, Chairman and Managing Director, D.C. Wimalaratne said,
"Usually this is the time when paddy goes at a good price,
but this year things are bad. We cannot imagine how the prices will
be in the future." "The lorries
are also not coming as earlier," Minneriya Farmers Society,
Acting Director, Karunaratne Abeygunasekera told The Sunday Times,
explaining the plight of the farmers. Furthermore
the wastage in storing has resulted in the farmers losing about
4 1/2 kilos per bundle of paddy weighing 65 kilos. Representatives
of 21 farmer organisations in Polonnaruwa will meet on Thursday
to discuss the crisis, Mr. Abeygunasekera said. "Already
about 70 paddy mills have shut down and we are badly affected by
this," Polonnaruwa Ekabadda Govi Sanvidanaya secretary, Wijesuriya
Perera told The Sunday Times. "There are only about three or four mills working on a daily basis, he added. It is definitely because rice was imported that we are having to face this debacle. There was an excessive quantity of rice in the market at the wrong time," Mr. Perera said. Meanwhile the
move to remove the fertilizer subsidy has led to traders hoarding
urea stocks and at present a grave shortage of urea is reported
at a time when it is most needed, Mr. Perera said. Meanwhile, some 200 paddy milling centres are set to close down due to the inability to sell the rice in the face of imported rice flowing into the market, leaving farmers in the lurch. PA
expects huge crowd for hartal, but JVP boycotts Chief organiser
and Opposition leader Mahinda Rajapakse said thousands of people
from trade unions, political parties and other groups were expected
to take part with the focus on the rising cost of living and privatisation. He said the
procession and rally were being held in the evening so that normal
work would not be disrupted. Mr. Rajapakse
said the JVP had asked that the protests should also be against
the ceasefire and the peace talks but the PA could not agree. JVP Parliamentarian K. Lalkantha said the JVP would not join tomorrow's protest as it believed the national question was the key issue. Student
police in school buses Education Minister Karunasene Kodituwakku held a crisis meeting with principals of 15 boys schools and two Colombo DIGs to discuss the extra security meassures. This week a
phased out opening of the affected schools took place with Pannipitiya
Dharmapala Vidyalaya, Maharagama Janadhipathi and St John's opening
classes on a staggered basis. Education Ministry
Additional Secretary G.L.S. Nanayakkara said the principals of these
schools had taken on the responsibility of curbing bad behaviour
of students in school buses or elsewhere. Ananda College
Deputy principal R. Ponnamperuma told said Ananda boys were now
under orders to wear school colours on their shirt pockets while
student societies have been set up to ensure good behaviour in buses. D.S. Senanayake Assistant Principal T.D. Fernando said two student monitors had been appointed for each of the school buses. Desmond
probes lawyers position in Nepal Mr. Fernando'also
ascertained whether the recently arrested lawyers in Nepal had been
arrested for representing suspected terrorists or whether there
was some substance in the reasons for their arrest, if their arrest
and detention was in accordance with Nepal's obligations under international
law. The delegation also ascertained if protection or remedies were
available for unconstitutional acts on the part of the State and
whether Nepal's laws and constitution are in principle consistent
with its obligations for basic rights. Prof. Phillip
Tahmindjis of the Faculty of Law, University of Queensland, Australia
and Council Member of the International Bar Association and Admiral
Paul Hoddinott, former International Bar Association Executive Director
were the other members of the Mission. The delegation met the Prime Minister, the Chief Justice, the Attorney General, the Law Secretary, the Home Minister, the chair of the National Human Rights Commission, the Inspector General of Police, representatives of the Royal Nepalese Army and the Chairman of the Bar Association of Nepal, during its stay in Nepal. Drug
expenditure can be slashed by 50% Dr. K. Balasubramaniam,
former senior lecturer in Pharmacology and now Asia Pacific co-ordinator
for Health Action International told a seminar Sri Lanka urgently
needed a public health policy and national drug policy through which
the cost of medical expenditure could be slashed and economic growth
accelerated. Addressing
the seminar organised by the Action Committee on Justice for Patients,
Dr. Balasubramaniam who says his highest qualification was being
a student of Prof. Senaka Bibile, pointed out that drugs were quite
different from any other consumer items. "In consumer
activities market forces play a great part and control prices through
competition while the consumers have the power to select whatever
they want. But in medicine the consumer cannot choose what he or
she wants. It is chosen by the prescriber- the General Practitioner
or Consultant. Therefore there is no free market in medicine. Market
forces do not operate in the pharmaceutical sector," he said. Displaying
charts and figures obtained through international research as a
WHO advisor on world drug prices, Dr. Balasubramaniam gave comparative
drug prices in 9 developing countries. He pointed out that 100 units
of one drug-Zantac-(ranitidine) cost 2 US dollars in India, 82 in
Zambia and as much as 116 in South Africa. "Thus
it is clear market forces do not operate in the pharmaceutical sector,"
he said. "But Sri
Lanka has decided to adopt market mechanism - including liberalization,
privatization and competition to promote economic growth. Can Sri
Lanka remove healthcare medicine from the mechanism of the market
forces? We have to answer that question. Let us see
what other countries have done. "In Sri
Lanka we have good quality generic drugs and that could be the reference
price. If Sri Lanka sincerely wants to lower drug expenditure it
must regulate the market. We need a national public health policy
and a national drug policy under which healthcare and drugs could
be regulated. In this national healthcare policy public health interest
should take precedence over commercial interests," Dr. Balasubramaniam
said. He pointed
out that retail prices for generics were about 50% lower in Sri
Lanka than in India but the prices of brand names here were double
the prices in India. "In Sri
Lanka there is a vast difference between the brand and the generic
prices. Retail prices of generic drugs brought through the State
Pharmaceutical Corporation on a process worked out by Professor
Senaka Bibile have not gone up much though the prices of brand names
have shot up. In Sri Lanka the prices of brand names are often about
120 times more than the generic names. "A comparison
of prices shows that the SPC is buying drugs at half the price paid
by private importers though they buy the same quality drug from
the same manufacturer. "Figures
show that a few drug importers in Sri Lanka are allowed to make
huge profits at the expense of the economy of the country. This is a waste
of foreign exchange," Dr. Balasubramaniam said. Another speaker
Dr. Joel Fernando said Sri Lankan doctors today were getting very
little objective updated information on drug prices and related
matters from medical authorities or associations. Instead they were
being flooded with largely promotional information from private
drug companies in addition to thousands of rupees worth of expensive
brand samples. The third speaker Dr. Eugene Corea cited Sri Lanka Medical Council guidelines which say that if a prescriber derives financial benefits directly or indirectly from what he or she prescribes, it may amount to serious professional misconduct. Mystery
death of research officer: Who did what? Family and
friends of the victim 33-year-old M. K. Piyaratne, claimed that
police had assaulted him after he allegedly tried to leave the Peradeniya
hospital in someone else's car. The mystery
began when the research assistant was admitted to Peradeniya hospital
some weeks ago with high fever. Family members alleged that doctors
had mis-diagnosed the ailment, first treating him for Malaria, then
for Typhoid. The patient had also complained of double vision but
doctors had allegedly ignored him. Mr. Piyaratne's wife Nilmini
said she had visited him last month but a few hours later Mr. Piyaratne
had reportedly left the hospital with the canula still fixed to
his wrist. He had allegedly
tried to get into a car that was parked and had bitten the hand
of the driver who was seated in the car. When the driver had shouted,
others around had assaulted Piyaratne, thinking that he was about
to hijack the car. He was later handed over to Peradeniya Police. Meanwhile, Mr. Piyaratne's university colleague D. R. G. S. P. Ranasinghe, who was passing that way in a bus alleged he had seen his friend on the road with Police, and being assaulted by them. He said he had got off the bus and tried to explain to the policeman who he was and that Piyaratne was sick and should not be assaulted. "When I
tried to explain to them, they said that he was a mad man and had
tried to bite the driver," Mr. Ranasinghe said alleging that
he too had been threatened by the police. Mr. Ranasinghe
said he had then rushed to inform Mr. Piyaratne's wife and a university
professor with whom he went to the police station, but they were
informed that Mr. Piyaratne had again been admitted to the Peradeniya
hospital. Nilmini Piyaratne
said she too had rushed to the police station and was told her husband
was taken to hospital but she claimed she saw police washing blood
on the floor. She claimed
that when she went to hospital she saw her husband with his hands
and feet in cuffs and a doctor told her he was dead on admission. ASP, G. B.
Peramune, claimed Mr. Piyaratne was not assaulted by the police,
but by the public as he was acting like a mentally disturbed person. The ASP said
they had written to the eye witness Mr. Ranasinghe asking him to
come forward and give evidence but Mr. Ranasinghe said he had received
no letter from the police. He said he had earlier given a statement
to a police officer saying he had seen Mr. Piyaratne being assaulted
by the police. Nilmini Piyaratne said her husband had no mental problem nor was he a thief and she was determined to clear his name for the sake of their three -year-old child. |
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