Why cant we just own it…if we cannot take it anymore?

For sometimes now, I have been reading through profiles of some of the most outstanding pharmacists of the world. One striking thing about all of them is that they own a piece of this lucrative industry. Many pharmacists and doctors seem to like to be employees more than anything else.
Visit anywhere, in the society meetings, and their websites and in many other forums where people of common interest discuss, and chances are pay or salary issues will be on top of the list. People will shout themselves hoarse, demanding that it is demeaning to be paid this or that. Of course, that is true, and for our case, I really support better pay befitting the sacrifices one makes to train to be and continue practising as a pharmacist. But who are the real money-spinners of the pharmaceutical sector? Who are the real owners of the institutions we are proud to work in? Who own these hospitals (and therefore are entitled to hire administrators who can put pharmacist’s interests first) that we are desire to work in?

It disheartens me when I see a pharmacist who is 20 years plus in the profession, still struggling in employment like a pharmacist intern. Well, some of these circumstances may not be of the individual pharmacist’s making, but surely, with the more than 1900 registered pharmacist in Kenya, a good number of us should be standing out as the real forces in the sector. We were not made just to draw a salary, but also to write the cheque.

I do not know about you, but I think your value as a professional can only be as much as your stake in the profession.

We will not be discussing about poor remuneration (a topic I will like to discuss further in the future) if the people who largely drive the process were pharmacists. It is only bankers, industrialists, agriculturalists, politicians, accountants, or real estate businesspersons, the main investors either directly or by proxies, in the pharmaceutical industry who have the guts to pay pharmacists and other professionals what they want-and whether their employees are happy with it (or not) is immaterial. It is their investment anyway, and in the grand scheme of things, your input forms a very small-almost insignificant-part of the return on their investments. A more ‘compassionate’ one will probably listen to your minuscule cry for a salary increase but then vanquish you with longer working hours or higher targets to gain on the lost ground.

I do not think I have enough influence to start talking big, like Donald Trump or his antonym, Ombega(this may be an inappropriate example) does, but I think I can at least say the bolt of reality has stricken me at a relatively young age, professionally. This thought has probably come out of frustration on my part, for the lack of a pharmacist that I can really identify with. Prof Kokwaro is definitely high on my respect list, but he alone cannot settle my simmering uneasiness. He is probably the only pharmacist I know who can be on the interview panel for a pharmacy related job by his own right, and not by delegation. But I am crying for more who I can look up to. I have read about a pharmacist (not in this country) who specializes in pharmaceutical packaging materials as well as patients’ dispensing bottles. All our local manufacturers (or to be specific large-scale compounders) buy their packaging materials from manufacturers of generic packaging materials. We know that pharmaceuticals packaging manufacturers require specialist packaging, which can be ribbed for the visually impaired or have the right degree of opacity for the right drug. Even the secondary or the tertiary packaging need to be appealing, both to the patient or the one who does the dispensing, but only a pharmacist knows best what can be appealing. We are seriously in need of people who lead the profession from the front, to guide us venture into the so many fields that are available for us.

The industry is probably our best bet, as much as the community pharmacy is. The community pharmacy obviously has an impact on an individual pharmacist and a few people around that individual. It is also one place pharmacists have ruled, but not without the irrepressible quackery that they have learnt to live with. But the impact is not sufficient enough to secure pharmacists interests in the larger pharmaceutical industry. I like both the spirit and the drive of the Sphinx Pharmaceuticals guys. They are really trying to live the dream of local pharmacists dominating their own industries. The Cosmoses, Laboratories & Allied, and to some extent the Elyses of this country do not really strike me as pharmacists friendly industries. Cosmos, like many firms run by some people with an exaggerated sense of self importance, is a major showcase of the caste system where you will always be the untouchable, and I prefer to be out of the touch by avoiding there and similar environments altogether.
Caste system, or any culture that comes out of it, is so asinine, if you ask me-the bottom line is we are all equal. Why work with or for somebody who does not stand taking a meal with you at the same table? Why participate in creating more wealth for the protagonists of such a rigid and disgusting social system? The truth is these are just crude businessmen using whatever crude means at their disposal, including distastefully exploiting the pharmacists’ professional skills and knowledge of the systems, to make money. The compensation to the pharmacist can make you cry, not just because of its meagre amounts involved (especially for the kind of input and dependability of most processes on the pharmacist) but because the pharmacist actually accepts to be subjected to such embarrassment. Who really cares about these so-called ‘laws of Manu’? Beta Healthcare and to some extent Dawa, however, seem to be doing something much more than just making money. I have a lot of respect for GSK as a multinational and the impact they have on the humanity. But GSK, the Kenyan chapter, does not impress me as a pharmacist, both in terms of its workings and as a centre of training of pharmacists. They are even reluctant to take intern pharmacists for training because they are just a little more than a distribution branch and do not manufacture much as such. And it is easy to know why; it under the siege of non-pharmacists who will do anything that is self-perpetuating. GSK is so dominated by commercial interests of its rich owners, yes, but the more worrying are their equally if not more appalling managers, who their only remote association with pharmacy is the products they know little about. Of course, they will defend their ignorance to death. That is what happens when strangers are in charge in your industry. You cannot blame them-they are just playing the game.

What must we do, and now?

Now we need to be in control of every sector that employs us, so that we can improve the terms of service for our younger colleagues. With pay issues out of the way, at least the only thing that they will have to do, as individuals, is to perform. We can then be able to do audits of all aspects of our practice that will be our performance benchmarks. This can happen even at the PSK level, just as RPSGB is attempting to do amongst its members, who happen to be all the pharmacists practising in that country, without exception. But first things first, let’s begin the race for the ownership of this industry, before we can successfully indoctrinate the new way of practising pharmacy into all pharmacists.

This thing of sucking up to others has to end. We can be entrepreneurs just like anybody else. So go out there and look for money from wherever you can, like agriculture, horticulture, sugar industry, dealerships, goat business, supply of goods and provision of services, publishing etc. Then bring back your fortune and invest in the pharmaceutical sector, from the packaging materials, manufacturing, research and drug development, clinical trials, (the infamous) marketing, distribution, wholesale and retail pharmacy, institutional patient care, private patient care, consultancies, education, the list is endless. You will be surprised with the results, just as much as you will be pleased with it.

Just take it from me, the many good things we want to do will be a mirage if we are not in control of our sector. Nobody else cares about pharmacy practice, other than the money involved. Let us deny them the money, and other good things will follow.