(BusinessWorld) IT TOOK Nikko Lae D. Abdon, 30, nearly a week to find medicines for her 66-year-old uncle, who got admitted in an intensive care unit room at the San Lazaro Hospital in the Philippine capital.

The drug tocilizumab, which is mainly used to treat arthritis, worked wonders to alleviate his pain after he was diagnosed with a severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Doctors also gave him remdesivir, an anti-viral drug originally made to treat hepatitis C.

“We were grateful that the doctors were able to save him,” Ms. Abdon, who works as a nurse at the hospital, said in mixed English and Filipino by telephone. “I didn’t like how we really struggled to find the medicines.”

“I can only imagine how hard it might be for others to see their relatives suffer because they can’t afford the medicines,” she added.

Ms. Abdon said they spent P20,000 for a vial of tocilizumab and P52,000 for six vials of remdesivir at senior citizen discount rates.

Many coronavirus patients in the Philippines have had to pay for expensive medicines to ease their pain as drugs in public hospitals are depleted and given insufficient healthcare insurance coverage from the state.