Pharmacists quit working Friday all over Turkey in a bid to protest government cuts in drug prices, which they say would force at least seven thousand pharmacy shops to shut down within a year.

Head of a Turkish pharmacists association said all pharmacy shops except for pharmacies on call, would remain closed for the day in what he described as "a warning shot."

"Our next move would not come as a warning but it would be delivered to yield results," Erdogan Colak, president of the Turkish Pharmacists' Association, told reporters outside a pharmacy shop that symbolically pulled down the shutters.

"We are set to hold a grand congress of our association next weekend. And this congress would take radical measures if the government fails to move to solve our problems," Colak said.

Price cuts for more than three thousand drug items were made official on Friday as pharmacists say the government had made no agreement with them to cover losses from their stockpiles.

Labor and Social Security Minister Omer Dincer said Thursday pharmacists' losses from stockpiles would be covered by pharmaceutical producers. 

AA