Thursday, February 2, 2012

PHC moved against sale of ‘killer’ drugs in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

The Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) on Wednesday petitioned the Peshawar High Court (PHC) against the use and open sale of the drugs in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa that had killed more than 120 patients in Lahore and other parts of Punjab.

PMA Provincial President Dr Hussain Ahmad Haroon filed the writ petition in the high court through his lawyer Mian Mohibullah Kakakhel. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government, secretary health, chairman of the Health Regulatory Authority, drug inspector, director general health services, director health services Fata, and chief executives of Khyber Teaching Hospital, Lady Reading Hospital and Hayatabad Medical Complex were made respondents in the petition.

The petitioner submitted that the drug manufacturers and suppliers were the same and the drugs manufactured in Karachi or Lahore were being supplied to all the hospitals in the country. He claimed the drugs that killed hundreds of patients in Punjab were also a potential threat to the lives of cardiac patients with pulmonary infections and other cardiovascular diseases.

Dr Haroon said these drugs are also a potential threat to the lives of thousands of patients of hypertension, diabetes mellitus and diseases relating to the nervous system. The petitioner submitted that he and his co-doctors felt the drugs stored in the hospitals of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the suppliers of the drugs and pharmaceutical companies might be subjected to laboratory analysis by the PCSIR and Aga Khan Laboratories or may be sent abroad for sampling. He said the heads of hospitals in the province might be asked to immediately stop the supply and use of the lethal drugs. He argued that the secretary health in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was not a doctor and knew nothing about the drugs.

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