Vijayawada: The Andhra Pradesh government is making all arrangements to ensure supply of adequate quantities of essential drugs to manage the third wave of Coronavirus pandemic in the state.
The state government has given instructions to the drug control administration authorities to contact pharmaceutical companies involved in manufacture of essential drugs to manage Covid-19, to produce more quantities to meet the increase in demand for such drugs instead of facing any short supply. The authorities are keeping track of the supply chain of drugs all the way from manufacturers to carry and forward agents, wholesalers, stockists and retailers and finally to the end-user who is the patient, to avoid any short supply.
The directorate general of health services (DGHS) has come up with a list of 55 drugs for ICU management of Covid-19 patients admitted in hospitals and also a general list containing 97 essential drugs that are projected to be required to manage Covid-19 and has requested the drugs controllers in all states and UTs in the country to take proactive steps to meet the stated objectives to ensure availability of the drugs with assured quality at affordable price and to supplement the efforts of government for management of the situation arising due to Covid-19.
The DGHS recommended several categories of drugs to be procured and kept ready which include vasopressors, emergency cardiac drugs, analgesia/sedatives/muscle relaxants, antibiotics/antimicrobial agents, nebulisation, antiepileptic, IV fluids and other drugs. Several essential drugs including nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory agents like paracetamol, antibacterial agents, antifungal drugs, antiviral drugs, cardiovascular drugs, dermatological drugs, gastrointestinal medicines, antiallergic medicine, medicine for respiratory tract, anticonvulsants, medicines affecting the blood, oxytocics, antianxiety medications, anaesthetic/analgesic agents and a host of others are also to be kept ready for use.
The top brass of health authorities is keeping a close tab on the stock position of all the recommended critical and essential drugs through the drugs control administration authorities during the weekly review to ensure that the state should have adequate quantities of drugs to use based on requirement.
In the wake of outbreak of seasonal fevers like dengue, malaria and others, the health authorities issued directions to keep stocks of drugs to treat them also ready. A senior official from drugs control administration said, “We are taking all requisite measures to ensure maintenance of adequate stocks of essential drugs all the way from manufacturers to retailers to use them in the event of outbreak of third wave of Coronavirus to avoid any trouble to the patients to get treatment as we faced short supply of some drugs like remdisivir and tocilizumab during the first and second waves of the pandemic resulting in losing several lives and also some people resorting to illegal practices like diversion to black market to sell them at high price.”
