A section of pharmacies in the State joined a nationwide strike called by All India Organisation of Chemists and Druggists (AIOCD) and downed their shutters on Tuesday in protest against the Union Health Ministry’s proposals to regulate the sale of drugs through a national e-portal and to legalise online trade in pharmaceutical products by framing specific rules.
Even when agreeing that the concerns of pharma retailers need to be allayed, many in the sector have openly hailed the Centre’s proposals as the best thing to have happened for regulating and monitoring the sector.
According to a draft notification issued by the Health Ministry, all drug manufacturers must be registered on the e-portal and should enter data relating to sale of drugs to distributors with the batch number, quantity supplied, and expiry dates. All distributors, including stockists, wholesalers, retailers, and e-pharmacies, should register themselves on the e-platform and enter details of stocks received, supplied, sold, and returned to the manufacturer.
“This is a very positive development that will regulate the pharma sector and help implement prescription auditing and monitoring and the offtake of drugs. e-pharmacies, with proper licensing norms and stringent monitoring, will improve people’s access to medicines and bring down costs. The concern of traditional retailers is mostly to do with the loss of their business but licensed e-pharmacies will only be a supplementary system and can never replace conventional retailers,” says K.G. Ravikumar, former professor of Clinical Pharmacology, Government Medical College, Thiruvananthapuram.
Rural areas
However, the AIOCD and the chemists’ association in Kerala, the All Kerala Chemists & Druggists Association, claim that most of the retailers are small-time traders and that the move to prevent sales if retailers are not registered could spell trouble for a large number of chemists in rural areas. They also claim that e-portal or online sales cannot work properly unless the drug regulatory mechanisms are strengthened.
Legalising online sales of medicines could lead to illegitimate trade in psychotropic substances and sale of medicines using fake prescriptions, they claim.
“E-portal for regulating pharma trade is a welcome move but as far as e-pharmacies are concerned, there are some genuine fears that need to be addressed. Unless the regulatory mechanism is stringent and monitored diligently, unscrupulous elements can explore the loopholes in the system to deal in psychotropic drugs or anxiety drugs. There is also the fear that e-pharmacies may encourage self-medication, use of steroid drugs, and antibiotic resistance owing to irrational prescriptions,” says Ravikumar, State Drugs Controller-in charge.
