In move to safeguard the interest of the pharmacists across the country, the Pharmacy Council of India (PCI) has decided to send in directives to the state drug controllers and the state pharmacy councils asking them to take strict actions to enforce the presence of pharmacist at retail counters across the country.

Through this initiative, the PCI wants the state pharmacy council and the respective state drug controllers to take requisite steps towards ensuring the implementation of the Pharmacy Act all across the country, in line with the implementation of the Drugs and Cosmetics (D&C) Act. Further to ensure its effective implementation, the Council has taken the decision to appoint pharmacy inspectors under all state councils as well.

Giving further details on this directive, Dr B Suresh, president of PCI said that they will be sending in this directive in a fortnight to all the concerned parties so that immediate steps can be taken towards ensuring the presence of pharmacists across pharmacy set up. “We will take all the necessary steps to ensure effective implementation of provisions of the Pharmacy Act, as this will not only help in uplifting the professional moral but will also help in developing practice standards. As of now we will observe on how effectively our directives are implemented, failing which we will strongly pursue this matter with the health ministry,” Dr Suresh added.

This move comes in the wake of the resolution passed during the recently concluded Indian Pharmaceutical Congress (IPC) in Delhi which pressed in for the presence of pharmacist in the pharmacy set ups, which includes drug stores, rural medical dispensaries, sub-centres, urban health centres, primary health centres, community health centres, district hospitals and even the central government, public hospitals and dispensaries, defense services and railways.

Manjiri Gharat, vice-president and chairperson, community pharmacy division, Indian Pharmaceutical Association (IPA) who also advocated this move pointed out that this comes as a huge relief to the scores of pharmacists who have been striving through years to get this passed, to better define the roles and responsibilities pharmacist in the country.

“This will be an important advocacy initiative taken by the Council to ensure the presence of pharmacists in pharmacies across the country, a much needed requirement for the public safety. We would like to extend our full support to the Council to realise this initiative as it is for the good of this profession,” she added. Further she suggested that for the up-gradation of the pharmacy practice and for patient centric services by the pharmacists, continuing professional development (CPD) of practicing pharmacists is the key factor and expressed interest in collaborating and closely working with the PCI to design CPD programmes.