Anyone can make a mistake. A wrong decision can also happen to central institutions such as the Ministry of Health (MZ) or the Supreme Pharmaceutical Council (NRA). The introduction of testing to pharmacies is more than a mistake - it is a disgrace of the NRA and Ministry of Health, because pharmacists, as a rule, should deal with drugs and not swabs. Pharmacies cannot become swab points at the expense of core business.
Walenty Zajdel
Testing in pharmacies - a disgrace of NRA and MZ
Published Feb. 18, 2022 08:02
The health minister made several mistakes with the testing. The pandemic has been going on for two years and during this period, private laboratories asked the Ministry of Health to enable antigen tests to be performed. Unfortunately, the Minister of Health did not agree to this, which means he made a cardinal error. On January 21, 2022, he issued a regulation on the list of diagnostic tests that can be performed by a pharmacist. There is no reason why pharmacists should rectify mistakes and omissions made by the Ministry of Health in performing antigen tests for SARS-CoV-2.
The collected swab is potentially infectious biological material. Occupational exposure is the exposure of an employee to the effects of hazardous and harmful factors while performing professional duties. During a pandemic, Ministry of Health and NRA should take measures that reduce, and not increase, the exposure of pharmacists to epidemic threats, because pharmacists, as part of their competences and core activities, must guarantee drug safety for the society.
Medicines in cardboard boxes are accepted in the admission chamber. A recently published study by Japanese scientists shows that Omikron stays on cardboard surfaces much longer than other variants - an average of 193 hours. Therefore, it was an extreme irresponsibility on the part of the NRA to insist that the swabs could also be collected in the admission chamber. On February 16, 2022, the Minister of Health issued an ordinance in which he shared the NRA's proposals that tests for SARS-CoV-2 could also be carried out directly in the expedition room - without the need to create a space limited by partition walls, constituting a pharmaceutical care room, as well as in the admission chamber. To say that this is a scandal is to say nothing.
The NRA forgot that the only suitable place in a pharmacy to collect swabs is a room dedicated to housekeeping equipment and cleaning supplies.
The negligible interest in performing tests in pharmacies proves that the vast majority of pharmacists understand the principle of compliance with the sanitary regime in the case of infectious biological material. Unfortunately, the NRA and MZ do not understand this.
Everyone has the right to be stupid. But some people abuse this privilege.
mgr farm. Walenty Zajdel
