Where's the papaverine? NMRA has flatlined on vital heart medicine

IN early April of 2025, this author in an article published in the Daily FT asked the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) to quit playing games with our hearts (https://www.ft.lk/opinion/NMRA-should-quit-playing-games-with-our-hearts/14-775045), but it seems to be continuing to cause heartache.

- By Devinda de Silva

Recapping the past

In 2024, the State Pharmaceutical Corporation (SPC) rejected several bids of the sole registered supplier for the drug papaverine - a critical vasodilator widely used in cardio-thoracic surgery - purportedly owing to their 'exorbitant' prices. About a year or so later, hospitals began to run out of papaverine stocks. With another bid from the same supplier still pending approval, the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) conceded that bottlenecks in their own registration processes prevented price competition.

The NMRA then scrambled to fast-track approvals, licensed a local manufacturer to produce papaverine domestically, and even began to turn a blind eye to illegal 'cheaper' versions of papaverine being sold to the market and used by hospitals. A recent debate in Parliament once again recalled that this Rs. 40,000-50,000 drug was being sold at the Rs. 300-400 range.