Remdesivir records in hospitals to be checked to prevent black marketing

A day after three people, including two staff members of private hospitals, were arrested for black marketing remdesivir injections, the district drug controller said they will start verifying stocks of the antiviral drug in all city hospitals from Tuesday

A day after three people, including two staff members of private hospitals, were arrested for black marketing remdesivir injections, the district drug controller said they will start verifying stocks of the antiviral drug in all city hospitals from Tuesday.

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Amandeep Chauhan, the district drug controller, said they will count the empty vials and cross-check them with the batch numbers. “The nursing staff of many hospitals have been found involved in illegal activities and black marketing antiviral drugs. Hospitals need to keep a close watch on them and ensure the injections issued for patients are used in the presence of duty doctors,” he said.

At least 43 hospitals are treating Covid-19 patients in the district. With a massive surge in the number of Covid-19 patients and deaths, the healthcare system is under stress. Medicines, oxygen and hospitals beds are in short supply, taking advantage of which many are engaging in illegal sale to make a quick buck.

At least six people have been arrested in five cases of black marketing Covid-19 drugs so far, said police.

The police said that in many instances, it was noticed that suspects were replacing new stocks of remdesivir with empty vials. Any hospital found involved in any illegal activity related to Covid vaccination and antiviral drugs will face strict action, including termination of licences, said officials.

Concerning the arrest of a staffer of Narayana Hospital in DLF Phase-3, Chauhan said, “Nitin Jose, who worked as a nursing staff supervisor at Narayana Hospital in DLF Phase 3, was involved in selling injection for ₹55,000. After he sold the first injection we activated the teams and verified the injection was original and checked its batch numbers so that we could track where was it supplied,” he said.

Commander (retd) Navneet Bali, regional director, northern region of Narayana Health, said, “We would like to confirm that the remdesivir injections of the batch numbers mentioned in the notice shared by police department were not supplied to or received by Narayana Superspeciality Hospital. The hospital is maintaining the internal records about remdesivir stocks and will extend full cooperation with the authorities on this matter,” he said. The police said they arrested Jose when he was supplying remdesivir to a decoy customer they sent.

Inderjeet Yadav, deputy superintendent of police, crime investigation department (CID), said that three of the suspects they arrested so far worked as a gang and shared their numbers with the families of patients. “Chetan Kapoor, a resident of Punjab, working as a senior security assistant at Max Hospital, Gurugram, was the agent who used to deal with families and used to send his wife for the deliveries,” he said.

An official spokesperson for Max Hospital said, “We are following all government orders and ensuring our stocks are checked daily and audited regularly.”

Another official from the investigating team probing the case said that many gangs are selling fake remdesivir vials in the city. “We are looking into details on who has bought them through them and how many deaths were reported from them. We are suspecting more staff members of these hospitals are involved and were helping them but the probe is underway,” said Yadav.

The suspects were produced before the district court on Monday and taken on two-day police remand.