Govt panel to monitor Amphotericin-B use; L-G, HC note scarcity

New Delhi: As L-G Anil Baijal on Wednesday called for immediate steps to ensure the availability of drugs related to black fungus and the newly launched D-2G for people in genuine and medically prescribed need, the Delhi government set up a four-member technical expert committee (TEC) to prevent the indiscriminate use of Amphotericin-B injection — used to treat the fungal infection.

The expert committee will be headed by Pulmonologist Dr M K Daga, and include Dr Manisha Aggarwal, Dr S Anuradha and Dr Ravi Mehar from Maulana Azad Medical College.

All COVID hospitals requiring Amphotericin-B for treatment of patients will have to apply to the committee which will meet twice a day to scrutinise these applications and facilitate rapid decision making "as time is of the essence in such cases", according to an order issued by the health department.

"The guiding principles for TEC shall be evidence-based clinically approved parameters as well as principles of equity, distributive justice and transparency," the order read.

The decision of daily meetings will be conveyed to all the stakeholders through e-mail and reasons for refusal will be written and informed to the requisitioning hospitals.

In fact, black fungus cases in Delhi have seen a rise in this wave, with Ganga Ram Hospital disclosing that around 40 patients with black fungus are currently being treated there and 16 others are on a waitlist as of Wednesday.

The AIIMS here is also reporting more than 20 cases of on a daily basis, said Dr MV Padma Srivastava, Head, Department of Neurology, AIIMS.

"In Delhi's AIIMS, there are more than 20 cases of mucormycosis reported in Emergency today," he said, adding the numbers were never like this before.

She further said that earlier the number was in single-digit, however the numbers have now crossed three-digit mark. We have made mucor wards separately at AIIMS Delhi, AIIMS Trauma Centre, and AIIMS Jhajjar, she added.

Significantly, the shortage of Amphotericin-B was also brought up in the Delhi High Court on Wednesday, which asked the Centre and the Delhi government to apprise it on the management and supply chain of this drug. It questioned how this drug could have bottlenecks in supply given it is locally manufactured.

In addition to the monitoring of drugs related to the treatment of black fungus, the L-G's office called for hospital, bed, and oxygen infrastructure to be ramped up considering the worst possible scenario in the future and for testing to not be lowered.

(With inputs from Nikita Jain)