Drugs for children and adolescents are in short supply across Europe, warn paediatrician associations in Switzerland, Germany, Austria, France and Italy. They are calling on health ministers to address the significant shortage quickly, reliably and permanently. They made the demand in open letters to their respective health ministers, the Swiss Paediatricians Association said on Monday. The Swiss letter was addressed to Alain Berset. “Just a few years ago it was unimaginable that the health of our children and adolescents would be permanently endangered by acute shortages in the availability of, for example, antibiotics, antipyretics and painkillers, asthma medicines and vaccines,” they wrote. + Why Switzerland is running out of pharmaceuticals Children and adolescents need comparatively few and relatively inexpensive medicines, which are not necessarily interchangeable with medicines for adults, they explained. “The shortages would mean that treatments could no longer be...
