SHILLONG: Coming as a blow to the patients in NEIGRIHMS, the Central-government sponsored Amrit Pharmacy, which provides medicines at reasonable rates, has been suddenly shut down by the state Controller of Drugs, after being informed that three of the five pharmacists working there had not provided their professional registration numbers.
This has created immense inconvenience for patients and attendants at NEIGRIHMS who now are compelled to purchase medicines from outside at a higher cost.
According to Acting Director NEIGRIHMS Dr P Bhattacharya, “Pharmacists are not easy to come by. Finally we managed to get two pharmacists and they were asked to register at the Office of the Controller of Drugs but the office is in a containment zone so they had to return without completing their work.”
Meanwhile, the person running the Amrit Pharmacy who also operates a pharmacy at Civil Hospital has threatened to close shop at Civil Hospital and shift the staff to NEIGRIHMS, if the two pharmacists are not registered at the earliest.
Plasma therapy
NEIGRIMHS Nodal Officer Dr Vijay Nongpyiur has informed that the institution has been mulling the idea of setting up of plasma therapy facility much before COVID-19 appeared here. Now the equipment have arrived but are hampered by the lockdown of the entry point at Byrnihat.”
“We are hoping to set up the plasma bank by mid-August. As of now we don’t have plasma donors except for the BSF personnel who recovered from COVID. There is a particular time after a patient recovers within which plasma can be taken. Since this is to do with human blood we have to be extra careful that everything is in order before we execute this project,” Dr Nongpyiur told this scribe on Tuesday.
Informed sources said that the state Health department was also exploring the idea of creating a plasma therapy unit at Pasteur Institute. The matter was under active consideration of the department, sources added.