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Medical laboratories in crisis as Iran scrambles for US Dollars

Medical laboratories in crisis as Iran scrambles for US Dollars
Iranian private medical laboratories are no longer able to import primary materials they need to work with, due to the country’s economic sanctions and currency fluctuation, the manager of one of the Tehran laboratories told Avatoday.
posted onJune 18, 2018
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“Hospitals and laboratories are buying most of the primary material from the west and the trades is in dollar. The private section is responsible to import the needs, but with the current situation they are no longer able to buy, and the government is not giving them extra money to buy the materials they need,” the manager talked to Avatoday in condition of anonymity.

According to the source, hospitals have not paid the annual money of the patients’ insurance to the laboratories and each hospital have 14 million toman of debt to its own laboratory in Tehran.

A confidential source inside the Ministry of Health told Avatoday that the government gave 5-years bond to the hospitals instead of money as the government is facing dollar shortage.

 The Iranian laboratories used to buy major primary materials from U.S and Germany, but they are now importing cheap and low-quality materials from China instead, which according to the inside sources it has affected the accuracy of the medical tests.