Bajhang District Administration Office (DAO) has sealed all five pharmacies at the district headquarters, Chainpur, for operating without obtaining permits from the Department of Drugs Administration.

A joint team from the DAO, the District Public Health Office, the District Hospital, and the District Police Office inspected the pharmacies in Chainpur on Wednesday. Chief District Officer Sunil Khanal said the team found out that none of the pharmacies were registered.

All five pharmacies in Chainpur— Surma Devi Pharmacy, Chain Medical Store, Bhagawati Health Clinic, Kalika Medical, and Jitendra Medical— were closed for operating illegally, Khanal added. 

Besides operating without permit, District Public Health Officer Daya Krishna Panta said, these pharmacies were also found over-prescribing medicines to the people to make quick money.

They were endangering the lives of people by making the public buy more medicines, no matter how simple the illness.

One pharmacy operator had sold medicines worth Rs 7,200 to a patients, according to a receipt confiscated by the inspection team. 

Dr Bishnu Khatiwada of Bajhang District Hospital claimed the number of patients with kidney and heart diseases was increasing in the district as a direct result of taking unhealthy amount of medicines peddled by local pharmacies. 

Fake doctor caught, reprimanded and freed A fake doctor has been caught practicing medicine from a pharmacy in Chainpur that was shut along with four others by the authorities on Wednesday for operating without licence. 

Pranaya Mandal, who had been seeing patients at Bhagwati Health Clinic for the past few months, admitted to forging his academic certificates and medical practitioner’s licence from India after he was caught while participating at a three-day health camp run by Seti Zonal Hospital, said Daya Krishna Panta, chief at the District Public Health Office. 

Mandal, however, did not face any legal punishment for defrauding the public. He was reprimanded and released on a condition not to repeat such act again.