Tornado at Pfizer NC facility adds to drug shortages in the U.S.

After a tornado hit Pfizer’s warehouse facility in Rocky Mount, North Carolina last week, the company has shared that as many as 30 drugs, including anesthetic lidocaine and injections of painkiller fentanyl, may experience drug shortages.

According to Albert Bourla, the CEO of Pfizer, the tornado only impacted the storage warehouse where finished medicines were placed, and none of the production sites were damaged. There is minor or next to no damage suffered by the production facility.

Drug Shortages and Supply Disruption Measures at Pfizer Facility Situation:

• Pfizer’s facility produces over 30 drugs with around 64 different dosages and formulations.
• Supply Disruptions: Approximately 64 dosages and formulations may face ongoing or potential disruptions.
• Customer Communication: The company sent a letter to all hospital customers, informing them of the supply challenge.
• Purchase Restriction: Pfizer decided to restrict the amount of affected drugs customers can purchase based on market share and inventory levels (less than 3 months) at distribution centers and wholesale chains.

Commissioner Robert M. Califf of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has ensured that the damage at the storage facility does not immediately impact contracting supply.

With hospitals and healthcare systems around the country brainstorming strategies to combat the shortages, Michael Ganio of the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists predicts that the impacts of the issue will be nominal.

As much as 8% of all sterile injectable drugs used in American hospitals can be attributed to this North Carolina-based facility. Injectable drugs produced here include therapeutics and neuromuscular blockers as well as anesthesia.

The company website also claims that a quarter of Pfizer’s sterile injectables used in U.S. hospitals are produced at this Rocky Mount facility.

In the case of some of the drugs provided by the facility, Pfizer is the only supplier in the U.S. market, but even then, it is possible for patients to find alternatives and substitutes for them. Many weeks of stock for these medicines are also still available at other company warehouses.

For most other drugs, there are other firms in the country that produce them. On the advice of the FDA, all firms producing drugs that are experiencing a shortage are requested to amp up their production.

It should be noted, however, that even before the supply was impacted by damage to the warehouse, many drugs on Pfizer’s shortage list were already experiencing a shortage in the country.

The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs produced a report at the beginning of this year, which came to the conclusion that the duration of drug shortages in the U.S. has increased in recent years. The report mentioned that before drug shortages lasted for one and a half years typically, but now more than 15 critical drugs have been in shortage for the past decade and a half.

This may have to do with the fact that in the case of generic drugs such as lidocaine injections, there are lower profit margins, and therefore, manufacturers are reluctant to produce them.

Often on the lookout for cheaper labor and manufacturing costs, overseas companies move production overseas, and this creates dependency in the country.