Retail Sale of Tamiflu Given Govt Green Signal

H1N1 drug Tamiflu will be available on a restricted basis at retail outlets, the government has announced. As per the new decision, Tamiflu will be sold on a restricted basis at 480 retail outlets in the country.

As of now, Tamiflu has been put under the Schedule X drug category, which means that only chemists who have the license to distribute it will be allowed to do so.

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Dr V M Katoch, DG ICMR and Secretary, Health Research said, “Under Schedule X, the patient will have to produce two prescriptions issued by the same doctor at the time of purchase. The chemist will have to keep one copy of the prescription for two years. The entire chain of movement of the drug is known by the respective state drug controller. The movement of each dose from the manufacturers to the patient has to be traced."

The decision to allow retail sale of Tamiflu was taken after 189 deaths in the country out of 6,359 cases of swine flu diagnosed so far.

Source-Medindia
RAS

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