Bhubaneswar, July 17: Sushama Mishra, 55, a diabetic, had to browse through almost all medicine stores in the city today to find the drugs prescribed to her, thanks to the short supply of medicines since the Goods and Services Tax (GST) came into force from July 1.
The GST replaces the multiple taxes levied by the central and state governments and has subsumed all the indirect taxes.
"My doctor prescribed me Galvus Met, an essential drug to control blood sugar. I went to drugstores at Capital Hospital, but to no avail. I visited several stores at Kharavela Nagar, Ashok Nagar, Acharya Vihar and Saheed Nagar, but in vain. Finally, I found it in a medicine shop at Khandagiri, that too, after looking for it for at least five hours," she said, blaming the government for the poor implementation of the GST.
This is not an isolated incident as many customers and suppliers continue to suffer from the post-GST impact. Among them, patients appear to be the worst hit.
Things have become difficult because of the short supply of drugs by pharmaceutical companies, which, according to the city-based pharmacists, have either not updated the post-GST prices or are still confused about its impact and hence remain far from making a re-assessment of the medicine prices. Many medicine stores here have run out of stocks.
A medicine store owner at Kharavela Nagar, Bidyadhar Bohidar, said problems with regard to over-the-counter medicines such as paracetamol and Saridon were few, but short supply of medicines for diabetes, blood sugar, and cancer was causing hardships for many.
"Tenomac is a frequently used drug for high blood pressure. It is a daily medicine for a patient. Irregularity in its dosage might lead to serious health problems. I have at least 10 customers, who take this medicine from me regularly. But, I am unable to provide them the medicine since it is in short supply since the past fortnight," said Bohidar, adding that he managed it in the first week by borrowing from other stores.
Amid such a scenario, the only stores that remain unaffected by the new tax structure are the Janousadhi shops of the Indian Red Cross.
"We have the stock of medicines according to our list of essential drugs. Our sale remains the same both before and after the implementation of the GST. It has not been affected in any manner," said a Janousadhi store operator at Unit-IX.
However, with most of the doctors not prescribing generic drugs, many patients find it almost futile to visit the Janousadhi stores. "I was diagnosed with Type-II diabetes last month. Since then, I have been taking Glucophage, a drug meant to control my sugar level. My medicine stock was exhausted a day ago. When I visited the Jan Ausadhi store, I was told that they did not have the drug and instead asked me to purchase the generic drug called metaformin. I am confused," said Unit-IX resident Nihar Patra.
