Bengal govt take steps to stop hoarding of masks and sanitizers

Kolkata,04 April(HS): The West Bengal government today issued strict instructions to all pharmacists and medical shops in the state in a serious bid to stop hoarding and black marketing of masks and hand sanitizers and prevent their artificial scarcity.

In a notification issued by the state Health Department at Nabanna, the state headquarters, here this afternoon, the government has banned ‘unlimited stock’ of masks and hand sanitizers and said all these shops would now be able to maintain their stocks as per the government instruction and their respective monthly sales figures.

As per the government order, no such medicine shops would now be able to keep over 100 pieces of N-95 masks and more than 200 pieces of two-ply and three-ply masks on a daily basis.

Regarding the stocks of hand sanitizers in each of these shops, the notification stated that the daily stock limit would only be 5 litres.

Any violation of the order would be sternly dealt with, the notification stated and indicated that there would be sudden checks by the health officials anywhere in the state at any time to prevent hoarding and black marketing of any of these emergency medical items.

Following the outbreak of COVID-19 last month, reports of hoarding and black marketing of masks and hand sanitizers have been coming from different parts of the state forcing the police and other officials to conduct frequent raids to recover them and distribute the same to the needy at proper prices.