Over 100 added to controlled drugs in Dubai

Over 100 medicines are to be added to the list of drugs which cannot be sold in Dubai without a medical prescription, the ‘Emarat Al Youm’  Arabic daily newspaper has reported.

Dubai Police has recommended the inclusion of more than 100 new medicines in the list after they were checked and found to have the same effect of certain types of narcotics.

Colonel Khaled Hussein Al Sumaiti, member of the supreme committee for modifying the drug list, who is also a chemical expert at the General Department of Criminal Evidence in Dubai Police, said that this list of medicines is the longest of its kind.

He said the list had been given to Dubai Police chief Major General Khamis Mattar Al Mazina.

Al Sumaiti said on the sidelines of the World Academy for Forensic Medicine conference the recommendation includes a number of medications used in the treatment of psychiatric and neurological diseases.

He pointed out that a drug for treatment of diabetes was also included after it was found to contain a narcotic formulation. Its classification will therefore be amended and process of dispensing codified.

The new list contains 32 new substances and combinations of narcotic substances.

He added such medicines are misused by some people.

He said Dubai Police had recommended the inclusion of 85 per cent of medicines containing narcotic substances in the list of controlled drugs.

Manufactures of these types of medications always try to create new formulations not included in the controlled list of drugs.

Dubai Police has upgraded some Class B medicines, which can be dispensed by any pharmacy, to Category A which cannot be sold without a physician’s prescription.

He added that manufacturers of these drugs sometimes complain because such measures often affect sales of their products. But such steps have to be taken after the impact of these drugs on people is tested.



 

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