Fleecing poor patients at medical stores has become a norm, as stores reportedly sold medicines at higher prices. People from different areas claimed that the prices of medicine were twice the rates fixed by concerned authorities. They alleged that the authorities had failed to stop this practice, and medical stores were earning illegal profits at the cost of poor patients. Asif Ali, a patient who came to buy medicines, said, “Even patients who go to government-owned shops were being overcharged.”
As these medical stores were in the confines of hospitals, patients preferred to buy medicines there instead of going elsewhere. Most of them had the impression that medicines sold through these government-owned shops were cheaper and genuine. People urged the government to take apt measures to control such unlawful practices, while medical stores running without licenses must be sealed.
