Coronavirus triggers a wave of self-medication in India
During the pandemic, Dolo became the favourite snack of India. The entire country was munching it as if it was the tastiest food on the planet. At least 3.5 billion Dolo pills have been sold since the beginning of the pandemic.
It seems people had become infatuated with this tiny tablet. The question is why did this happen? Dolo 650 is a pain killer which treats headaches and fever. Why did we consume 3.5 billion of them?
Did so many of us got sick in the last two years? Did doctors prescribe them to us? The answer to these questions is that we did what we do best—self medicate.
Around 52% of Indians today self-medicate, which means they buy, consume and suggest medicines to their friends and family without consulting a doctor. If we have a headache, we pop Disprin.
If we have a cough, we drink cough syrup. If we have heartburn, we pop an antacid. All of these drugs are readily available in most Indian homes. We have a big box of diverse medicines that we like to open daily. What if the heartburn for which we took an antacid was actually the signal of a coming heart attack.
We ignored the problem and let it grow into something bigger. Ideally, we should have consulted a doctor. Instead, we played doctor and ended up with misdiagnosis. This is one of the many problems with self-medication.
We know it yet we do it. One of the main reasons for doing this is that we do not feel the need to see a doctor, especially for a minor health issue like a headache, fever, cough, cold or even stomach ache. Moreover, visiting a doctor is expensive. A doctor consultation in a private facility will cost at least Rs. 500/= and it can go up to Rs.1500/= rupees as well. The expenses may not end there.
The doctor may ask to run tests like an ECG, Ultrasound or an MRI, and these can cost up to Rs. 4000/= Of course, there are more affordable options like government facilities, but they are always packed. Getting a slot for a test is quite a fight, and getting a doctor’s appointment is a long way. So popping a pill saves us time and money.
Another factors that promotes the bad habit of self-medication in India is that chemists double up as doctors, and they also prescribe medicines for minor ailments. When we are unsure which pill to pop, we ask the nearest chemist. He may not be an MBBS, but he does have counter experience. We have safely assumed that the two are the same. Self-medication is dangerous.
The most common type of medicines we keep at home are antacids, pain killers, antibiotics, cough syrup and sleeping pills. In India, most of these are available over-the-counter. We consume them without a prescription and often lose track of the dosage. This leads to unwanted side effects.
The over-consumption of antacids that we thought was safe can lead to malabsorption. A study has been conducted for our reference. Too many of antacid pills affect the small intestine. It will not be able to absorb enough nutrients. The body will become weak, resulting in bone fractures. The dosage of antacids has to be determined by the doctor. Women and children are more at risk of malabsorption.
Pain killers damage the kidneys. Over-consumption of pain killers increases the load on kidneys. The kidneys may stop functioning, requiring dialysis or in extreme cases transplant. Research has been conducted that pain killers may give temporary relief from backache or toothache, but they increase the risk of heart attack.
Medical journal Harvard Health suggests that the risk increases within the very first week of taking the pill. Across the medical fraternity, there is near unanimity that the dangers of self-medication is real.
The danger of over-medication is real too. Pain killers are not our best friends. They have links to stomach ulcers. The chemists do not warn us about the risk of medicines. Over-consumption of antibiotics leads to antibiotic resistance.
The over-the-counter market exploits this half-baked knowledge of the average person to sell its products. The Indian OTC market is currently valued at $7.5 billion. This has happened primarily because of our bad and fatal habit of self-medication.
Antibiotics kill bacteria in our body without harming us, but the abuse of antibiotics has put us at risk all over again. India is the largest consumer of antibiotics in the world. In 2020, around 17,000 doses of antibiotics were sold in India.
The antibiotic use has been so rampant that the bacteria in our bodies have become resistant to them. In India, resistance of E. Coli to powerful new drugs is 82%. For example, if a doctor prescribes an antibiotic for urinary tract infection, there is a good chance that the pill may not be effective against the bacteria because of antibiotic resistance.
This is a very scary situation as medicines stop working for the person. Drug resistance has become a leading cause of death globally killing more than one million people in 2019.
Another reason why we should not self medicate is because we do not know how the medicine will interact with our food. It may react with our existing medicines like diabetes and thyroid medicines.
We need to realize that every drug has a side effect. Molnupiravir was given emergency use authorization during the Coronavirus pandemic to be given only after prescription from a doctor. People started sharing prescriptions over WhatsApp groups and purchasing it from stores without authorization from a doctor.
What they did not realize was that Molnupiravir has side effects like causing congenital defects and is not recommended for women of reproductive age or for that matter even men. People did not know this and continued to buy and use it like Dolo.
Today most of us are taking pills for no apparent reason. A couple of sneezes and we start taking pills that have been prescribed for Coronavirus assuming ourselves that we might have been affected by it. One person tests positive and all other members of the family start taking precautionary medicines.
There have been horror stories of Covid self-medication. People have taken medication from a prescription given to a family member without confirming with a doctor whether it was really needed and in the process have died because of it. It is the ready availability of drugs that fuels this kind of self-medication habit.
India lists medicines under two different categories. One category is prescription drugs and the other category is for drugs that must be sold with a cautionary label. But unlike other countries, India does not have a category for OTC drugs. The phrase OTC has no legal recognition in India. A lot of prescription drugs are sold without a prescription.
To prevent the malady of self-medication from hurting us further, India needs strict and implementable rules, which is the first step towards stopping self-medication. The next step is to make verified medical professionals more accessible.
Online consultation platforms have helped tremendously as have virtual meetings. More needs to be done, especially keeping the rural population in mind. We also need to make healthcare more affordable.
This will encourage more people to seek medical help. We must educate ourselves, be responsible, trust the experts and stop forwarding Whatsapp remedies and also stop sharing our prescription with others. All these easily implementable steps will go a long way in eradicating the menace of self-medication and help India become a more healthy nation.
edited and proofread by nikita sharma
