A team of the Food Safety and Drug Administration (FSDA) on Wednesday found that scheduled medicines were being sold without proper bills at two Amrit pharmacies on the King George’s Medical University (KGMU) campus.
One store was in Queen Mary’s Hospital and the other in the Old OPD block. These medical stores also didn’t have proper storage for drugs, said officials.
Two Affordable Medicines and Reliable Implants for Treatment (AMRIT) stores were checked by drug inspector Madhuri Singh who said six samples of different medicines were collected for lab tests. The FSDA team suspected that the medicines were not of standard quality.
The inspections were carried out in wake of complaints filed at the state government’s public grievances cell. These were forwarded to the FSDA for fact finding. However, the KGMU authorities said there were no anomalies.
The record of Schedule H drugs sold from the Amrit stores was allegedly not available with the staff, indicating they might have been sold without proper billing.
Schedule H drugs are those, which cannot be purchased over the counter without the prescription of a qualified doctor. The union health and family ministry has (in all) listed 550 drugs under this category and there are strict rules for their sale. Stores keep some of these medicines as per the demand.
{{/usCountry}}Schedule H drugs are those, which cannot be purchased over the counter without the prescription of a qualified doctor. The union health and family ministry has (in all) listed 550 drugs under this category and there are strict rules for their sale. Stores keep some of these medicines as per the demand.
{{/usCountry}}“We sought the records for sale and purchase of drugs. The records and storage of medicines were not proper,” said Madhuri Singh. She added, “Samples of the scheduled drugs seized by us will be tested in the government lab for quality check.”
She said other anomalies were also found at Amrit stores.
“The in-charge of the Amrit pharmacy said all documents were shown to the FSDA officials. Though the pharmacy is not directly run by the KGMU administration, an explanation has been sought from the in-charge,” said Dr Sudhir Singh, spokesperson, KGMU.
The team inspected another medical store in Thakurganj where they collected a medicine sample and also stopped sale of scheduled drugs. “This inspection was also carried out on the basis of complaints filed at the public grievance cell,” said Rama Shankar, assistant commissioner, FSDA.