Resumo:
Drug treatment is a very important tool in promoting, protecting and restoring health, and this can be seen both in the massive presence of the pharmaceutical industry in the health sector and in the regulations of the Unified Health System (SUS), for example, the Organic Health Law, Law No. 8,080/1990, which states that every citizen has the right to “comprehensive therapeutic assistance, including pharmaceutical assistance”. To guarantee this right, Brazil adopted a Pharmaceutical Assistance model in line with the best practices defined by PAHO: list of essential medicines, rational use of medicines, access to medicines and guaranteed financing. This study aimed to analyze the methods of acquiring medicines from the Basic Component of Pharmaceutical Assistance adopted by the municipalities of the state of Bahia.
For this purpose, the databases available in the state of Bahia were used, which record the various methods of drug acquisition by municipalities in 2022 and 2023: direct bidding by the municipality, purchase by the municipality using the Shared Price Registry (RPC), and transfer of drugs from the state to the municipalities. After processing the data, 55 pharmaceutical specialties (PS) that met the analysis criteria were identified. It was observed that the state obtained the lowest average price in 34 PS, followed by the RPC with 12 PS and purchase by the municipality with 09 drugs. Analyzing by macro-region, the lowest average price was found in 10 PS purchased by the west, followed by the east and north with 08 PS each.
The results indicate that the best average prices were concentrated in the state, but the data available were insufficient to assert this superiority. The Shared Price Registry, in turn, proved to be an advantageous alternative, offering competitive prices and a simplified purchasing process for municipalities.
