Court allows Chandigarh cops to give Remidesivir to health department

By LE Desk

Chandigarh, April 26: In a significant development, a local court has allowed the UT police to hand over at least 2,970 Remdesivir injections to the office of Director of Health and Family Welfare Services, for further distribution to government hospitals in the city.

These injections were part of the illegal consignment seized from a pharmaceutical company in Baddi tow in Himachal Pradesh last week. Thirty of these injections have been sealed and sent to a laboratory for examination of their authenticity.

SP Ketan Bansal on April 25 said, “We moved an application in the district courts, Sector 43, seeking permission to hand over these injections to the health services for further distribution to hospitals for Covid-19 patients. The court today accepted our plea. We will hand over these injections to the health department soon. We are also planning to send the 30 samples for examination to Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission (IPC) in Ghaziabad’’, The Indian Express reported.

Of late, there has been an acute shortage of antiviral injections such as Remdesivir and Tocilizumab in the region.

Sources said, “UT administrator VP Singh Badnore had directed Adviser Manoj Parida, and DGP Sanjay Baniwal to find out legal ways to help Covid patients use these drugs.” Pharmacists say a limited stock came to Chandigarh and was sold off within hours.

A Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by SP Ketan Bansal had seized the injections and arrested six people, including the director of Health Biotech Limited, on April 17. Later, an accused from Kerala tested Covid positive, and was admitted to GMSH-16. The other five accused tested negative.

https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/chandigarh/court-allows-chandigarh-cops-to-give-remidesivir-to-health-department-7289104/