Equality in pharmacies distribution: Case of Iran

Equity in access to health service is one of the most important targets of policy makers in most countries. Access to health resources in the community lead to greater accessibility to them, so it has been as one of economic consideration in allocation resources. This paper is a retrospective and cross-sectional study which examined the distribution of pharmacies as a one of the most important health resource in Shiraz during 2006-2011.  The census and estimated data on the distribution of population were obtained from the Statistical Center of Iran and the data on the number of total pharmacies were obtained from Food and Drug Administration. We plotted the Lorenz curve and calculate the Gini index using Excel 2007. Also, stata 11 was used for regression analysis. According to result The Gini index for the distribution of pharmacies during considered years was closed to 0.25. Gini index for public pharmacies was 0.449in 2006 while it was 0.503 in 2011. For private pharmacies the Gini index was 0.225 in 2006 and 0.224 in 2011. The Gini index for distribution of pharmacies in total was 0.257 and 0.250 in 2006 and 2011 respectively. Therefore distribution of pharmacies in Shiraz have not been equitable in general, then some interventions like reallocation of the pharmacies can help to achieving to better access to this resource.