Regulate production, distribution of black fungus drugs: HC

Nagpur: Concerned over the exponential rise in mucormycosis cases across India, the Nagpur bench of Bombay high court on Wednesday asked the Centre to regulate production and distribution of its medicines from all 26 manufacturing companies to avoid shortage.
A division bench comprising justices Sunil Shukre and Avinash Gharote also requested the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) to issue directives for reducing prices of its medicines.
“Mucormycosis cases have risen alarmingly and its treatment may be out of reach of several patients. There is yet another problem arising from the short supply of all drugs used for its treatment. It’s necessary that some steps are taken by the government to bring down the prices to an affordable level,” the bench stated.
After intervener’s counsel M Anil Kumar furnished the Maharashtra government’s Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for mucormycosis treatment, the bench further directed to issue a detailed and more specific SOP that should include medicines that are inadvisable by the doctors.
“On going through the present SOP, it’s seen that it does take care of the concerns expressed by the experts regarding toxicities of some of the drugs. However, considering the fact that some of them are highly toxic and affect kidney, it’s necessary that the detailed SOP for their prescription and use is issued.”
While hearing a suo motu PIL based on TOI report where Shreerang Bhandarkar was appointed as amicus curiae along with Nidhi Dayani, the judges noted that medicines used for treating mucormycosis patients are quite costly and very high quantity of doses are required.
Earlier, IMA counsel Bhanudas Kulkarni filed an application seeking directives to the respondents in view of black fungus affecting several patients after recovering from Covid-19.
“In the last 15 days, 43 eyes have been removed and 26 deaths have taken place due to this disease. In the last two days, 109 new cases have been reported. IMA has obtained information from experts in the field and after collating it, has summarized those opinions in this application,” he said.
Government pleader Ketki Joshi then submitted May 18 GR that included mucormycosis patients for availing the benefits under Mahatma Jyotiba Fule Jan Arogya Scheme.
Kulkarni further pointed out from the report that although the spores of this fungus are present in the air, they badly hit the patients whose immunity has been reduced considerably, including weakness which develops after recovering from Covid-19 and due to misuse of steroids.
‘Start awareness campaign to prevent spread’
The HC directed Nagpur and Amravati divisional commissioners to immediately start an awareness campaign in Vidarbha to acquaint the public with the cause, effect and preventive measures to be taken to tackle black fungus.
“IMA has already furnished guidelines to be followed to safeguard patients from the disease. The commissioners shall ensure that these guidelines are given wide publicity in Marathi, Hindi and English, their posters be pasted at different places, and those should be circulated in social media through public information officers,” the justices said before adjourning the hearing till May 27.
The orders came after IMA contended that time has come now for the government to launch an awareness campaign regarding cause and symptoms and issue an advisory on precautions which can be widely published and also issue modified SOP for treatment of this disease. It also submitted that it’s necessary that all the hospitals are directed to maintain stricter norms of hygiene.