Hospitals in areas where coronavirus patients are proliferating seem to struggle to maintaining the supply of antibiotics, antivirals and sedatives and other drugs produced in the countries where pandemic has either ceased or reduced their manufacturing. Unnoticed by the general public, with a focus on the lack of personal protective equipment or the PPE and the ventilators being the urgent need of the hour- hospitals are constantly concerned about the upcoming shortage of lifesaving drugs. This is backed by the fact that Indian authorities as well as experts of other nations producing the drugs keep guaranteeing the supplies for their respective citizens.
New York State, with the highest number of infections and mortalities in the US, has seen a surge in demand for fentanyl and other sedatives needed for patients with respiratory failure placed in the ventilator for up to two weeks. This might sound a bit depressing but then, another sedative called Midazolam was recently found to face the official drug shortage as claimed by the US FDA (Food and Drug Administration) last month. “Everyone has been discussing the requirements for more vents, but no one is discussing the needs for patients when they are on the vents, the sedatives, anesthetics and paralytic agents,” said Onisis Stefas, vice president and chief pharmacy officer at Northwell Health, a 23-hospital system in New York.
The scenario is truly haunting for the asthma patients, who are or may in the future prospect, get prone to severe breathing difficulty in the absence of the drug. As in this time, where a drug could have otherwise curbed the discomforts for asthmatics, they are rather at the risk of getting exposed to the most vulnerable environments. It simply calls out the generic enterprises to intervene here provide an optimal solution for the mankind.
