Government bans these 14 FDC medicines; check if you have them in your home

Medicines Ban: The government today (June 3, 2023) banned the sale of 14 Fixed Dose Combination (FDC) medicines. From now on, these medicines will not be sold in the country. These medicines were being used for the treatment of cough, cold, respiratory infections.

What is FDC: Fixed Dose Combination?
 

FDCs are the medicines which are made by mixing two or more medicines.

Many experts have been opposing such FDCs for lond as these medicines are also banned in many countries.

The government has banned the combination available for the treatment of fever, diarrhoea, cough, cold, respiratory infections.

As per the notification, the expert recommended that there is no medical justification for the use of these FDC and they may involve risk to humans.

It has also been said in the notification that it is necessary to ban the manufacture, sale or distribution of these FDCs in the larger public interest.

This long-pending step has been taken on the basis of the recommendations of the Expert Committee and the Drug Technical Advisory Board.

In 2016, the ministry launched a drive to filter out drug combinations from the Indian pharmaceutical industry by banning around 350 FDCs, affecting over 2,700 branded drugs.

Apart from banning cocktail drugs, DCGI may also focus on banning codeine-based drugs in a phased manner.