Image used for representative purpose
NEW DELHI: A day after India imported 50,000 vials of Tocilizumab, a key Covid-19 drug made by the Swiss pharma company Roche, the Centre has issued a strict advisory saying private hospitals will have to source the drug only from the state governments for all patients who need it urgently.
“No separate quantity of Tocilizumab is being directly allocated to private hospitals,” the order stated. Until now, private hospitals had been asking patients and their families to arrange Tocilizumab, a drug which is used to bring inflammation markers and cytokine storm un-der control. Cytokine storm is an auto-immune response of the body triggered by the Covid virus where the body starts to attack its own cells and tissues rather than just fighting off the virus.
But this crucial drug’s availability has become a concern for India while tackling the second wave ofthe pandemic. Officials told TOI that Maharashtra will get the maximum number of vials, 6,380, out of the total 45,000, each an 80 mg dose. The next highest allocation is for Karnataka with 6,150 vials followed by Kerala (4,500), UP (2,420) and Rajasthan (2,185). Delhi is getting an additional 980 vials.
FacebookTwitterLinkedinEMail
