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Maharashtra to use drug-detection devices to screen medicines at govt facilities
The screening will cover healthcare institutions ranging from primary health centres to district hospitals
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Maharashtra’s public health department will for the first time use counterfeit drug-detection devices to conduct primary screening of medicines stocked at government healthcare facilities across the state, health minister Prakash Abitkar said on Wednesday.
The initiative is aimed at strengthening surveillance of medicine quality and detecting suspected counterfeit or substandard drugs at an early stage. Independent teams will visit healthcare facilities across the state’s eight divisions to screen medicines in stock, officials said.
The department will train a separate team of pharmacists to operate the devices. The first phase, covering training and primary screening, is expected to be completed within three months, officials said.
“The quality of medicines supplied to citizens cannot be compromised. The healthcare system is being strengthened to ensure proper quality checks at healthcare institutions,” Abitkar said at a meeting at the Health Services Commissionerate in Mumbai on Wednesday.
The screening will cover healthcare institutions ranging from primary health centres to district hospitals. The devices will be used only for preliminary screening, while medicines supplied by vendors will continue to undergo detailed quality testing through laboratories.
Abitkar also directed officials to establish an independent laboratory mechanism to examine the quality of medicines supplied by vendors.
According to the health department, the initiative will strengthen its medicine-quality surveillance system by enabling suspected counterfeit or substandard medicines to be identified during inspections. Medicines found suspect during primary screening can subsequently be subjected to detailed laboratory testing.
The meeting was attended by Maharashtra State Procurement Authority chief executive officer Dr Bapu Pawar, health director (Mumbai) Dr Nitin Ambadekar, health director (Pune) Dr Vijay Kandewad and joint director Sunita Golhait.
