Hospitals may lose remdesivir supply if families told to get drug: Collector

Pune: Remdesivir allocation of a hospital will be frozen if it asks relatives of Covid patients to buy the drug from the open market, the district collector has said.

The Centre procures remdesivir vials from manufacturers and distributes them to states that pass on the stock to districts.

This loop ensures hospitals get stock based on the number of admitted patients. Hospitals are also not supposed to send families looking for the drug in the open market. “Stringent action, in terms of freezing the daily supply, will be initiated against a hospital if it asks families to buy remdesivir from outside,” said district collector Rajesh Deshmukh.

But small hospitals said they often have no choice but ask families to get the drug because the district administration does not always allocate required supply.

Hospitals said when patients’ families realise remdesivir is not being administered because of shortages, they often volunteer to get the drug from outside and pressure doctors into prescribing it.

Aniket Joshi, who treats Covid patients at 10 city hospitals, said, “If a hospital needs 20 vials for 20 patients, it gets 15 vials. Sometimes, even less. So it has to skip the dose for rest of the five patients.”

Joshi said despite counselling, many believe Covid treatment is incomplete without remdesivir.

He said, “Patients even call up family to tell them they are not being given remdesivir. The relatives then put pressure on doctors to prescribe the drug. We won’t have these problems if district officials ensure hospitals get the required number of vials.”


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