Aasandha Company has decided to resume sending dispense codes to phones for collecting medication through the Aasandha scheme.

Aasandha said that starting today, when dispensing medication under the company's scheme, they will again start sending dispense codes to the phone of the person receiving the medication.

After the person collecting the medication shows their ID card and provides their phone number, the dispense code will be sent to that number. Aasandha stated that the pharmacist can only dispense the medication after entering this code into the Aasandha portal.

While this arrangement has been made, in a meeting held on the 19th of this month where senior officials from NSPA were summoned to the Parliament's Social Affairs Committee regarding a submitted issue, the problem of pharmacies charging excessively high prices when billing Aasandha was highlighted.

Responding to a question from Dr. Ahmed Shamheed, MP for South Hulhumale' constituency, Heena Waleed, CEO of the National Social Protection Agency (NSPA), said that drug prices are being reduced through bulk procurement. She also mentioned that many pharmacies have not accepted and are not implementing the changes made by the government to the drug list to reduce prices.

Heena said that drug prices in the Maldives are beyond the reach of citizens, and compared to regional countries, drugs are being sold at 15 times higher prices in the Maldives. She noted that this includes profits ranging from 300% to 4000%.

On the 27th of last month, the government decided to control the prices of 250 most commonly dispensed drugs under the Aasandha scheme. NSPA says this will save approximately MVR 220 million annually.