The Health & Family Welfare Minister Balbir Singh Sidhu has directed the all Civil Surgeons to personally enquire the purchase and dispense of de-addiction drug Buprenorphin- Nalaxone in their respective districts and submit the report in week.Disclosing this here today, the Health Minister said that the instruction has been issued to all civil surgeons to constitute 3 members committee comprising of civil surgeon and other 2 senior officers of the department for this purpose. He also instructed the civil surgeons to visit in all private de-addiction centres and ensure the proper compliance of SOP set by the State government.Balbir Singh further said that health department has monitored the procurement and dispense of medicine through Government Central Registry online in real time. He said that as per licensing rules 2011, it is mandatory for every private de- addiction centre to follow government instructions issued from time to time. He said that to bring cent percent transparency under the de-addiction programme, it was also made compulsory for the private de-addiction centres to submit the data manually as well as online to the FDA and district authority. He said that recently, submitted data was cross checked by FDA (Food & Drug Administration) where difference in data was found.
He said that show-cause notice has been issued to the 96 de-addiction centres. He also said that strict legal action would be taken against the erring centres after the enquiry.The Minister added that Government had launched OOAT program on October 26, 2019 and at the same time a central registry software system which is an online portal. He said that every patient taking medicine for de-addiction was required to be registered in this online portal and dispensation of medicine was also entered online.Mr. Balbir Singh Sidhu also divulged that in July 31, 2018, a standard operating protocol was issued by government through which it was made compulsory for every private de-addiction center to get registered on this system and enter every patient in this system to ensure the accountability of every tablet of buprenorphine through this system. He said that every center had been given User-ID and password for doctor and for support staff. Notably, Buprenorphin-Nalaxone is largely used worldwide for the de-addiction programme and recommended by the WHO.