Antibiotic production, one of the priorities of the Cuban pharmaceutical industry

HAVANA, Cuba, Aug 23 (ACN) Very early in the morning, workers of the 8 de Marzo Pharmaceutical Laboratory Company begin one of the most important tasks at this time for the country: the production of antibiotics destined for each of the pharmacies in the national territory.

Xenia Madrazo Sagre, general director of this entity belonging to the Group of the Biotechnological and Pharmaceutical Industries of Cuba (BioCubaFarma), explained that, since the arrival of new inputs and raw materials last July, the production of peninsilamic drugs and cephalosporins, medicines that mostly fight bacterial infections, has restarted.

The recovery of the production scale in this important national reference center will allow the gradual arrival in pharmacies and public health centers of cephalexin, cefixime and amoxicillin, starting in September.

A costly investment process is also underway to start up another injectable cephalosporin plant next year, said Madrazo Sagre.

In the midst of the shortages caused by the U.S. economic and financial blockade against Cuba, along with the complex logistical crisis unleashed after the pandemic of the novel coronavirus, the young automation engineer Aslan Mora Perez makes important innovations to maintain the equipment that produces these medicines.

The Cuban pharmaceutical industry has difficulties in the acquisition of raw materials and spare parts and it is a very difficult task that all the workers of the company do to keep all our equipment in operation, he said.

Also at the Novatec Base Business Unit (UEB), which belongs to BioCubaFarma's MedSol Laboratories, they are working non-stop to supply hospitals and health care centers with azithromycin, another of the indispensable antibiotics in the country, which is part of the protocol for attending patients affected by COVID-19.

To date, out of the 359 drugs to be produced by BioCubaFarma for the basic list of Cuban medicines, 251 have been covered, which evidences the effort of the Cuban pharmaceutical industry to recover its productive scale.