Surat: Crime Branch of Surat Police on Saturday arrested six persons for alleged black-marketing of Remdesivir injections. According to Surat Police Commissioner Ajay Kumar Tomar, police arrested six including a laboratory technician, laboratory owner, medical store owner, and a medical representative, as part of a crackdown on rackets involved in black marketing of Remdesivir injections.
"We sent a decoy to a medical store where it was not available. But outside the medical store, a person offered to provide an injection for Rs 12,000," said the Police Commissioner.
Police said the suspects procured left-over and unused Remdesivir injections from the stock Nitya Hospital, as one of the partners of the Hospital, Vivek Dhamelia the owner of the medical store was helping in the procurement of the injection.
"The accused got the injections from a hospital. The hospital would get it from Civil Hospital and sold the unused injections to the black marketeers. The injection, which is priced at Rs 899, was being sold at Rs 12,000," Tomar added.
Amid a shortage of such injections, the Surat police had got tip-offs that these were being sold in the black market in the Parvat Patia area of Surat city.
Around 800 Remdesivir injections were allegedly stolen from Hamidia Hospital in Madhya Pradesh's Bhopal, a case has been registered by the police.
"17 boxes of Remdesivir have been stolen. Each box contains 48 injections and only a few of the boxes were opened," said Assistant Superintendent of Police Ramsnehi Mishra on Saturday. A case has been registered in the matter. Further investigation is underway.
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