Karnataka State Registered Pharmacist’s Association(KSRPA)  has now called for the immediate abolition of Schedule ‘H’ to the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules 1945, in view of the enforcement of  Schedule H-1. The Association fears that the pharmacy retail and wholesale outlets in the state could be harassed by drug enforcement officers, even if Schedule H1 only mandated sale with prescriptions.

In this regard, the Association has been communicating with the Drugs Controller General of India and the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare which have not reverted on this. Now it has communicated to the President of India Pranab  Mukherjee to look into the issue.

“The new schedule, H-1 was enforced from March 1, 2014 and contains the names of 46 prescription drugs, which are often misused or abused. Some of these are addict forming medicines and antibiotic. The overuse of antibiotics could lead to incidence of drug resistant bacterial infections. The government has rightly introduced Schedule H-1 and drugs coming under this clause would be sold after a  prescription is provided by the patient to protect the public health”, Ashokswamy Heroor, President Karnataka State Registered Pharmacist’s Association stated in his communiqué to President Mukherjee.

“ At the same time, we want to bring to the notice of the government that the Schedule H, is outdated  and be omitted from the D & C Rules 1945. All drugs enlisted in Schedule H, should be made non-prescription drugs or over-the-counter. This is because enforcement officers from the drugs control department would conspire extracting bribes from medical shop owners for having sold these drugs under Schedule H too  without a valid prescription,” he added.

If the government is of the opinion that Schedule H is essential, then some of the drugs which are to be taken lifelong for chronic conditions, may be deleted from this Schedule. For instance, these could include drugs for hypertension, diabetes, heart ailments, where patients cannot become drug resistant. For the purchase of such drugs, we cannot expect a patient, to bring prescriptions every time. By deleting such drugs from schedule H, the harassment meted out to poor chemists may be reduced to a great extent, said Herror.

Earlier KSRPA had made several attempts with central government officials to ensure omitting  Schedule H from the D&C Rules 1945 as this would definitely create problems for scores of pharmacy outlets if they dispensed the drug without a prescription.