His Excellency the Minister of Health, Dr. Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al-Rabeeah, approved the decision of the Committee, assigned to consider the violations of the Saudi private health institutions at Jeddah Health Affairs General Directorate, to fine the owner of a private hospital a sum of SR 100.000; due to the absence of a Saudi director of the pharmacy, aside from detecting medicines unlicensed by the Ministry of Health (MOH).
The decision was issued upon a sudden inspection tour of the Committee, which detected and recorded the absence of a Saudi pharmacist as a director of the pharmacy, which is regarded as a violation to Article (3), Paragraph (B) of the Law of Private Health Institutions and Pharmaceutical Products. The Committee also detected 9 medicines unlicensed by MOH, violating Article (19) of the Law of Private Health Institutions and Pharmaceutical Products.
Therefore, the committee issued a decision fining the owner of the hospital SR 10.000, in addition to a total of SR 90.000 for the nine unlicensed medicines (SR 10.000 each), pursuant to Article (37-2) of the abovementioned Law. That is to be added to referring the pharmacist to the Committee assigned to consider the violations of Health Practice Law at Jeddah Health Affairs General Directorate.
The MOH emphasized that it would take all the statutory procedures, including the precautionary closure, against any health institution that does not adhere to the required quality standards of health services; in an endeavor to oblige such institutions to improve their conditions and address all irregularities observed there, pursuant to the statutory procedures.