The Kerala Medical Services Corporation Ltd (KMSCL) will open four more outlets of Karunya Community Pharmacies at the premises of the medical colleges in Alappuzha, Kottayam, Thrissur and Kozhikodu before February 15 this year. The infrastructure facilities like air conditioned store rooms are nearing completion, said Biju Prabhakar, managing director of the Corporation.

But the Corporation has clarified that its initiative, Karunya Community Pharmacy Division, is presently concentrating on sale of specialty drugs on discounted rates through its own outlets established at Medical College Hospital at Thiruvananthapuram and the one in a rural area in the capital district. The MD asserted that currently KMSCL had no plan to start Karunya Community Pharmacy (KCP) outlets in general hospitals or at lower level health centres.

While responding to the story appeared in Pharmabiz on January 12, Biju Prabhakar said without any insurance scheme for the project, it would be difficult for the Corporation to start new outlets in all the government hospitals for sale of high tech medicines for life saving and lifestyle diseases. In the rational list of essential drugs (RDL) prepared by the drugs advisory committee, government has decided to procure and sell highly priced 327 drugs in the initial stage, and later on 107 anti-cancer drugs were added to the supply. Further it was decided that the facility would be set up only in medical colleges where there is scope for sale of specialty drugs, and watch the viability of the scheme before expanding it to general hospitals, district hospitals and taluka hospitals which have only very less volumes, he said.

“It was easy for KMSCL to start 35 outlets without looking at the viability. After the starting of the anti-cancer drugs and RDL supply, the sale of Dhanwanthari Medical Store in Government Hospital in Ernakulam has come down from a daily sale of Rs.1.70 lakhs to nearly Rs.50,000. The sales of SAT pay in counter in Thiruvananthapuram and in the Medical College pay in counter were also affected. Whereas, sale at the KCP at the Medical College outlet has gone up to 6.75 lakhs per day. What would have been our fate if I had started this without understanding the impact of RDL in all the GH, DH and TH,” Biju Prabhakar asked.

Regarding Jeevandhara scheme in Andhra Pradesh, the MD said Karunya Community Pharmacy scheme in Kerala is not a model project of AP scheme. KCP is exclusively for branded generics, especially for branded speciality expensive drugs. This is entirely different from Jeevandhara of AP which is supplying un-promoted branded generics, and the branded drug initiative in Rajasthan. In both the schemes, the doctors are compelled to write prescription in generic names.

But in the case of KCP, the doctors write the name of the brands. Costlier drugs are supplied through KCP outlets and common drugs are given freely to the public through government hospitals, that is what is happening in Kerala. He said, in Kerala 10 to 27 per cent of the population have lifestyle diseases like diabetes, hypertension, heart ailments etc. and consume essential drugs like insulin.

“We made a profit of about Rs.75 lakhs within one year, but certain expenses like advertisements, training, new investments etc. have affected the profits. From one outlet we got a net sale of Rs.2.5 lakh. All the drugs are procured through centralized schemes and sold on very low margin. The same procurement and sales division is enough to expand the scheme all over the state, but the decision has to come from the government,” he told Pharmabiz.