Help provide badly needed meds, Pimental appeals to drug companies

Sen. Aquilino Pimentel III. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — Senator Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III appealed on Friday to pharmaceutical companies and retail drug stores to provide the lacking medicines badly needed by survivors of super typhoon “Yolanda.”

Pimentel said there is an “acute shortage” for medicines in the worst-hit provinces of Samar and Leyte and Tacloban City where hospitals and municipal health centers have stopped operations as there are no more drugs to administer to patients.

“Drugs like insulin and other antibiotics are required to prevent the spread of disease in the face of mountains of debris and human corpses that have littered the streets and occupied the flattened communities devastated by the monster howler,” he said in a statement.

Pimentel cited the case of a mother, who survived the storm but died because she failed to get medication from a hospital that ran out of medicines and still without power, five days after tragedy struck Tacloban City.

The senator said he himself has transformed his office at the Senate as a relief center to accept and process goods and assistance for the ravaged cities and provinces in the Visayas region, including victims in Panay Island, Northern Cebu and Palawan.