Apart from the proposed plan to distribute free drugs through the public health institutions, the Centre is mulling another scheme to provide tuberculosis drugs free of cost to all those required in the country, through the chemist shops directly.

According to the plan, the TB patients who are registered with the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) will be able to buy, free of cost, the prescribed medicines from any shop in the country. A national consultation was held recently to discuss the issue and further modalities were being worked out, sources in the health ministry said.

The scheme will require Rs. 100 crore additional to the existing RNTCP programme. The government is planning to introduce the same by the next fiscal year. The patients will be given unique IDs and can then buy the drugs from any shop as per their schedule. The government will bear the expenses. The modus operandi for reimbursing the payment is being worked out.

The national consultation reported that 90 per cent of the TB patients in the country do not buy the drugs regularly due to the out-of-pocket expenditure involved and their treatment module remains incomplete and thereby ineffective.  More than 60 per cent of the patients could not afford the existing high prices of TB medicines.

India reports 15 lakh new cases of TB every year.   About one in six deaths among adults aged 15-49 are caused by TB.  Nearly 10,000 cases of multi-drug resistant are estimated to occur annually. TB was declared a notifiable disease in May this year, making it compulsory for all private doctors, caregivers and clinics treating a patient of this air-borne disease to report the case to the government.

Meanwhile, the ambitious plan of the government to give free drugs through the public health centres as part of the universal coverage is still stuck now. The programme may be introduced from the public health centres some time during 2013, it is learnt.