A GNRC Medishop inaugurated on Thursday

Aug. 26: A leading super-speciality private hospital today inaugurated 16 brand medical shops in the city to ensure circulation of proper drugs.

The inauguration of the Guwahati Neurological Research Centre (GNRC) Medishops came a day after the Forum of Former Medical College Teachers of Assam asked the state government to evolve a mechanism to check the unabated circulation of spurious and sub-standard drugs in the market.

The forum also submitted letters to all public and private hospitals to stop purchasing medicines through middlemen and deal with the firms and companies directly.

Addressing a news conference here, neurologist and chairman-cum-managing director of the hospital Dr .C. Borah said the problem of spurious and sub-standard drugs had been aggravated as most pharmacies are unable to make out whether the medicines they handle out are genuine or not.

He said the GNRC Medishops are a chain of modern medical stores offering a bouquet of services. The outlets at Khanapara, Six Mile, Panjabari, Hengerabari, Hatigaon, Matgharia, Kalapahar, Pandu, Bharalumukh, Jatia, Amtal, Kharguli, Narengi, Guwahati Club, Beltola and Beltola Survey would purchase drugs directly from the companies. Borah said the existing pharmacies have very little idea of what is known as a one-stop service shop in drug retailing.

The chain will also offer several purchase-linked free benefits like blood sugar test every month, ECG test once in three months, EEG test for epileptic patients once a year, health check-up for diabetic, cardiac, hypertension and neurological patients, personal accident insurance worth Rs 50,000 and mediclaim insurance worth Rs 30,000.

Dr B.K. Gogoi, president of the teachers’ forum, yesterday said the menace had assumed such a proportion that spurious and sub-standard drugs had started finding their way to even top private hospitals and pharmacies.

The forum mentioned several cases where patients failed to recover after consuming costly drugs. Finally, doctors detected that they were taking spurious medicines.

The Telegraph recently exposed how spurious and sub-standard drugs have flooded the city, putting the health and life of people at grave risk. The health department sounded an alarm after a probe revealed that 16 pharmacies sell fake homoeopathic drugs.