Wasted medicine is a fundamental problem for the health sector, and patients suffer from it too.
The problem has many sides. One is waste at home. For many patients, the dose they need does not match the amount in the pack, so they have to buy a whole pack, sometimes an expensive one, without needing all of it. They keep the rest until it expires without using it again, and it ends up in the bin, together with many valuable chemicals.
Some patients also throw medicine away after trying it for a short time without seeing an immediate cure, and buy another one instead. This comes from a lack of awareness and education about medicines.
Then there are medicines that need no prescription but that people like to keep at home, such as medicines for diarrhoea or vomiting. People buy them in large amounts to store, and they expire or spoil through poor storage and have to be thrown away, wasting both medicine and money.
Several solutions and personal initiatives have been proposed. Some pharmacists run charity collections: patients donate leftover medicine to the pharmacy after finishing their treatment, and the pharmacist, after checking it is still usable, gives it to patients who cannot afford it. But such personal initiatives remain limited because no charity organises them, so they should be supported by the authorities and charities so that they can spread. Another, better solution is for drug companies to make packs of different sizes to suit different doses and patients' needs. This would cost the companies more, but it would help reduce the waste of expensive chemicals.
Health authorities, drug companies and pharmacists should therefore teach patients about the stages a medicine goes through and how much money and human effort goes into it, and spread awareness about medicines through talks and media campaigns to reduce waste.
By pharmacist Diana Arafa
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