Relatives of people with psychiatric and neurological problems denounced that, given the shortage of medicines and the lack of solutions from the authorities to this problem, they have had to make trips to pharmacies in other states to continue with their treatments and even resort to the market. black.
Maribel de la Cruz Pacheco, mother and caregiver of a child under the age of 13 diagnosed with autism, mentions that since last December her son stopped having access to clozapine and due to the lack of this drug in the health sector, he has had to resort to both methods.
“One month we ran out of medicine, because we couldn’t get it anywhere and I had to choose to get it on the black market… (the price) is a little higher than that of the pharmacy, but we run the risk of not being delivered and ripped off,” explained the mother.
In addition, he argued that whenever he resorts to the illicit market, he tries to check aspects of the medicine that help him make sure that it is original, such as the batch, expiration date, among other characteristics; The truth is that most of the time they are not sure that the product is what it claims to be.
For her part, Pilar Pérez, wife of a patient who also requires clozapine, reported that they have had to pay between 1,300 and 1,400 pesos for the drug, when its price in pharmacies is 700 pesos; In addition to the fact that they have been victims of fraud by people who ask them for deposits and disappear after receiving them.
On the other hand, Maribel explains that, sometimes, “we look at various pharmacies in the country where they have medicine, (after contacting us) they tell us ‘they have it in Reynosa’, ‘they have it in Tampico’, ‘there are two boxes’, for what we mark at those points where they tell us the availability, we send the prescription (…) so that they can set aside the medicine for us, ”he commented.
Protest in Cofepris
Patients with mental illnesses and family members complained at the Cofepris facilities, in the Nápoles neighborhood, for the shortage of psychotropic drugs and reproached the authorities for not having a “plan B”, after Psicofarma suspended operations.
After the protest began and after being received by the authorities of the Commission, the spokesman for the protesters, Jorge Elías Téllez, commented that they were leaving the place angry and without a solution, since he denounced that the people who spoke with them were unaware of the subject thoroughly, despite being the regulatory authorities.
