Punjab chemists on strike today, protest e-tailing of medicines

Amritsar: As many as 25,000 retail and wholesale chemist shops across Punjab will remain closed on Friday in protest against e-tailing of medicines, which, they believe, will hamper their business interests. This will also promote illegal use of habit-forming drugs through online sale by e-pharmacies which could be alluring customers through their big discount business module, they said.

While agreeing that online sales of medicines will cause massive financial losses to the chemists across nation, G S Chawla, officiating president of Punjab Chemists Association told TOI on Thursday, “There are no checks to verify the prescription of doctors’ medicine e-tailing companies. The prescription could be a fake one also which will lead to rampant use of spurious drugs, besides drug abuse will increase.”

The Union health and family welfare ministry, earlier in September, had issued a draft notification allowing registration and licensing of the online drug trade and the final notification is expected to be issued before mid-October. That will pave way for anyone to start online sale of drugs after obtaining necessary certification.

For the convenience of emergency patients, the indoor hospital pharmacies are kept out of the strike.

Chawla said as many as six habit-forming drugs were banned in Punjab but anyone could have access to these medicines through e-pharmacies using fake prescriptions.

He said 8.5 lakh retail and wholesale chemists across India will go on strike on Friday protesting online medicine business, saving the health of needy patients, saving youth from habit-forming drugs, controlling scarcity of medicines, stopping irrational competition and securing livelihood of retailers.

Pathankot District Chemists Association president Rajesh Mahajan said the pharmacy bodies had made several representations to the department and ministers concerned but to no avail. “Our national level meet is on October 20 and 21, and if the government didn’t withdraw the notification, we can consider going on indefinite strike,” he said, adding that they could also decide on chemists and their family members’ support in the ensuing general elections. “We are not just chemists but voters also,” he said.

General secretary of the District Jalandhar Chemist Association J S Chawla expressed concern that the online sale of medicines would lead to unemployment. “I have four employees now. If my business suffers due to the online sale of medicines I will be forced to cut down the number of employees,” he said. The online sale of medicines would be a major jolt to the government’s initiative of making Punjab a drug-free state, he added.