Kill two birds with one stone. That was the government’s plan with Jan Aushadhi pharmacies, set up by the Department of Pharmaceuticals. These pharmacies would provide generic medicines — medicines that have active ingredients that are identical to the patented/originator drug — at much cheaper prices. Sometimes as much as 90% cheaper than the price of branded drugs.
At the same time, these pharmacies would offer employment—unemployed pharmacists, women, those from the marginalized communities, you name it. The only prerequisite is that the applicant has a diploma or a bachelor's degree in pharmacy, or intends to employ someone who has these degrees. Once set up, the government would handle the rest of it — from sourcing the drugs to the software for billing.
Two birds. One stone.
The plan seems to have been a great success—from 80-odd stores in 2015 (when the scheme was overhauled) to over 8,000 stores across the country as of November 2021. That’s the sort of growth even the most-well funded startups would be happy with.
But if it sounds too good to be true...it probably is.
As of 2019, the latest available official figures, only five states—Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Gujarat—accounted for over 70% of Jan Aushadhi medicine sales. And only 155 stores were operating at the threshold of Rs 2 lakh worth of sales per month, government think tank Niti Aayog observed.
“Running these stores could be best compared to operating a philanthropic store,” says one Mumbai-based pharmacist who runs a Jan Aushadhi store. The margins are far too low. Another pharmacist, this one based in Delhi, claims that he earns a monthly margin of Rs 15,000 ($200) from the Jan Aushadhi pharmacy, less than half of what he earns from just one of his two private pharmacies.
And the PMBI, or the Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Bureau of India, which is solely responsible for supplying the drugs to Jan Aushadhi pharmacies, was running at a loss in 2019. That year, trade receivables—the amount owed by pharmacists to PMBI for drugs purchased—accounted for 57% of the operating revenue, hurting the society’s cash flows.
What’s behind the persistent difficulties dogging a scheme that, by all accounts, sounds like a well-intention attempt at making medicines accessible to the poor???? still unsolved queries by Mumbai Multimedia Studio www.multimediastudio.net