Hospitals and drug stores refuse services

Ashok Kadam, 64, a heart patient was turned away by several pharmacies before he finally found one opposite the KEM hospital in Parel, Mumbai that was willing to sell him medicines. “The decision to ban Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes was taken in a hurry and poor people are suffering,” the senior citizen complained.

He was one among the many harassed patients who were turned away by pharmacies and hospitals — both public and private — as change became a huge problem.

While public hospitals were instructed on Tuesday night to accept notes of Rs 500 and 1,000 for the next 72 hours, there was little they could do when patients poured in. However, there was no clear instruction for the private hospitals, leaving room for the hospitals and laboratories to act as per their discretion.

“While we have told our treasury department to accept the notes we don’t have the change to return back to the patients. There are patients who are giving Rs 500 for a fee of Rs20,” said Dr Avinash Supe, dean of KEM hospital, Mumbai and Director, Medical Education and major hospitals. Many patients were being turned away across civic hospitals for non-emergency procedures due to this reason.

“We are accepting the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes but we have no change left to return to the customers,” said the pharmacist at Liberto pharmacy in Airoli, Navi Mumbai.

The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi has a much simpler solution — they just waived off. “OPD card charges of Rs10 will not be charged for walk-in patients for the next two days,” said V Srinivas, Deputy Director (admin), AIIMS. “All clinical services for out-patients where billing per transaction is less than Rs 500 will not be charged on November 10 and 11.”

Patient outside medical store at Parel unable to buy medicines because of lack of change at the pharmacy.

As complaints about private labs refusing to accept the notes from patients who poured in, Maharashtra’s health minister Dr Deepak Sawant said that strict action would be taken against such labs. Patients, especially those needing critical medicines were the disadvantaged lot.

“In Lok Nayak hospital you could get medicines from hospital dispensary but in case a medicine has to be bought from outside, it created a lot of problems for the patients. Chemists should give credit slips and return the change to patients later ideally,” said Dr Anurag Mathur, a senior doctor at state-run Lok Nayak Hospital in Delhi.

E-pharmacies too expected their cash on delivery services to be hit. While most customers tend to use pre-paid methods like cards and mobile wallets, a sizeable number pays in cash. “75% of our customers tend to use prepaid methods but since this is a temporary ban we not expecting a lot of difference. It is too early to comment on the effect that it will cause,” said Pradeep Dadha, founder and CEO of Netmeds.com that has presence in 700 cities and towns across the country. He believed that pharmacies that accept cards are unlikely to be hit.

With inputs from Maitri Porecha