Panel SA: Pharmacist cuts employee vacation to meet demand for flu medicine

The Aché laboratory reorganized its production chain of medicines for flu, colds and respiratory diseases to meet the demand.

The volume of orders until this Wednesday (19) was 270% higher than scheduled for January. And production, which would be 4.2 million units of drugs in the month, reached 5.7 million units, according to Márcio Freitas, executive director of operations at Aché.

The pharmaceutical company says it has directed employees from other lines to produce cold and flu medicines, in addition to expanding the operation to three shifts and scheduling work weekends.

The collective vacations of the factory teams were shortened from 20 to 10 days, and about 20 temporary employees must be hired, says Freitas.

The pharmaceutical company, which had already made a similar move to account for the production of painkillers in the peaks of hospitalization by Covid, says that it also anticipated the purchase of raw materials and packaging for the medicines. “Orders that we would need to receive only in three or six months, we ask suppliers to deliver now”, he says.

In the assessment of Freitas, demand should continue high in the first quarter. He says the drugmaker can still expand production capacity if necessary.

The planned production volume of Decongex, Aché’s flagship for colds and flu, doubled in January to 2.1 million units. So far, the drugmaker has received an order for 3.2 million units of the product — 487% more than forecast.

Sales of the drug, which does not need a prescription, also hit a record in December, with 1.7 million units sold. In the first 11 days of January alone, 725,000 units were sold, 260% more than in the same period last year, according to the pharmaceutical company.

Already Sorine’s order entry jumped from 177,000 units to 510,000 units in the period.

with Andressa Motter e Ana Paula Branco