Fake drug market flourish
Tuesday July 31 2007 02:16 IST
BHUBANESWAR: The recent expose of the proliferation of spurious drugs across Orissa, more particularly the tribal and backward KBK regions, has underlined the urgency to make sweeping changes in the monitoring and regulatory system.
That an apathetic Government and a corrupt administration has helped the fake drug market flourish in the State is no more a secret. And this calls for taking some definitive steps like establishing the National Drug Authority (NDA) on the lines of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of US and implementation of the Haathi Committee and Mashelkar Committee reports, experts said.
In year 2002-03, the then Union Health minister had convened a meeting of 13 states including Orissa where the respective state health ministers were asked to actively strike against the spurious drug manufacturers and the market.
A report had then pointed that Orissa could be a big spurious drug centre in years to come ostensibly for three glaring facts: high illiteracy especially in tribal and rural areas, corrupt health administration and geographically contagious to spurious drug capitals like Bihar, MP and Andhra Pradesh.
The weak health profile of Orissa with high malaria and waterborne diseases incidence also added to the concerns as spurious drugs mainly cater to anti-malarial drugs and antibiotics.
However, when the Union Government proposed for the establishment of NDA Orissa was one of the states vehemently opposed to it. Presently, the states have the licensing power which is vulnerable to corruption. If NDA takes shape then it will take powers on to itself.
According to ASSOCHAM report, in states like Orissa 40 percent of the drugs supplied to the public health centres were spurious. As high as 60 percent of drugs did not have the active ingredient, 19 percent had the wrong ingredients while 16 percent had harmful ingredients.
The Haathi committee report recommended one drug inspector for every 100 retail outlets and so for every 25 manufacturing units along with formation of intelligence cum legal cells.
Even, the Mashelkar committee report submitted in 2003 asked the high risk states to set up special courts to try spurious drug cases, making it a non-bailable offence and empowering the police to prosecute the offences.
Given the dire facts, the Government's knee-jerk reaction to the fake racket is not going to yield any salutary results unless it goes on for a massive sample survey to figure out the spread of fakes and immediately act on the Haathi committee and Mashelkar committee reports.
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