Caretaker health minister announces investigation into reported cancer drug shortages

BEIRUT — Caretaker Health Minister Firass Abiad announced on Saturday that an investigation would be opened into shortages of several cancer drugs in Lebanon, after reports circulated in the media about a shortage of the following four products: Opdivo, Tecentriq, Ibrance and Xtandi.

Here's what we know: 

    • A committee of inquiry has been formed at the ministry to carry out, over the next two weeks, this investigation “with the persons concerned” in order to determine whether “infractions” have occurred, Abiad said in a statement published by the state-run National News Agency.

    • Lebanon's economic collapse over the past three years has hit the health sector hard. Many medicines are in short supply or are now inaccessible for a large segment of the population, 80 percent of whom live below the poverty line according to UN figures.