PESHAWAR: The case of spurious drug registered against Khyber Teaching Hospital, Peshawar has sacred the staff involved in institution-based practice (IBP) at the medical teaching institution.

Six packets, each of 10 tablets of a famous antibiotic, were seized from the pharmacy shop of the hospital on the very second day of its establishment in July 2017.

Following investigation, FIR was registered when it emerged that the medicine was spurious.

Private medical stores blamed for conspiring against KTH pharmacy

Sources said that private drug stores outside the hospitals were behind the raid because of fear of declining sale in the presence of hospital-based pharmacy.

“How the drug inspector came to know about the presence of illegal drug in pharmacy on the second day of its opening,” they questioned. They added that the pharmacy had earned Rs150 million so far.

Only six packets of the drugs were seized for which KTH presented the receipt of the main store in Namak Mandi’s wholesale drug market that was also sealed.

“The first-ever case of government versus government has caused scare among the doctors and other staff working in the IBP. They regard the case as support to private business of pharmacies,” said the sources.

Kashif Aziz, the manager of IBP at the hospital, has been arrested last week in the case and former medical director Prof Rohul Muqim is also facing arrest.

Prof Rohul Muqim is a laparoscopic general surgeon and has pioneered IBP in KTH where patients pay Rs600, far less than the consultants charge in medical teaching institutions for checkup. Fee in other medical teaching institutions ranges from Rs1,000 to Rs2,100.

The pharmacy was established in KTH to ensure availability of quality and cheap drugs to patients within the hospital’s premises.

Sources said that drug stores outside hospitals were experiencing declining in their sale after establishment of the pharmacy as patients preferred to buy genuine medicines.

There has never been any case registered against a public sector hospital in the province for drug-related offences. It is the first case of its kind in the province.

However, officials said that they took samples from pharmacies in government hospitals to test their contents and price etc but never found the product spurious while the drug sample collected from KTH was tested spurious due to which FIRs were lodged.

“The case was heard by provincial quality control board four times and relevant officials of KTH were booked under Section 11 of the Drug Act, 1976,” they said.

Officials said that 27 FIRs were registered in 2018 in drug-related cases. A total of 5,621 cases were decided last year of which 4,430 were referred to drug court, they said.

Five days ago, members of the IBP committee at the hospital resigned for lack of security.

The Board of Governors of KTH had not taken any notice of the case and arrest of the IBP manager as opposed to other medical teaching institutions where such arrests couldn’t be made without the go-ahead of the BoG chairperson.

Dr Muqim was removed by health department from the post of medical director on Jan 21 over amputation of a diabetic patient’s hand. Subsequently, he was restored by court but he resigned, citing personal reasons.

Sources said that he was not in the good books of health department because he had refused to appoint certain people against the rules.

“Now, he has been dragged in fake drug case,” they said. Presently he works as in-charge professor of Surgical-C ward at the hospital.

Sources said that former medical director of the hospital registered the pharmacy in is name following approval of the health department through BoG.

Published in Dawn, March 21st, 2019