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New Zealand:
Elderly at Risk as B12 Runs Short
By
Janine Rankin
May 23, 2003
New Zealand - The vitamin, marketed as Neo Cytamen, is used mainly to treat pernicious anaemia and vitamin deficiency in elderly patients, says Palmerston North pharmacist Glen Caves. Mr
Caves said he had to lend a box if the injectable vitamin to the
Palmerston North Hospital pharmacy the other day, but now almost everyone
had run out. Pernicious
anaemia is an auto-immune disease that interferes with the body's ability
to absorb vitamin B12. Inadequate amounts of the vitamin restrict the
blood's oxygen-carrying capacity. It affects patients' nerves, causing
numbness and tingling, a shortness of breath and a feeling of lethargy. Under
normal supply conditions, it is easily corrected with injections of
vitamin B12. Many patients return to normal after an intensive course,
while others need ongoing therapy. "Some
elderly people could go downhill without it. They may feel very, very
weak." Mr
Caves said prescribed dosages seemed to have increased. Supplier
GlaxoSmithKline corporate communications head Ron Murray said the New
Zealand demand used to be for about 4000 units a month, but that demand
had "grown amazingly" in recent months for reasons he didn't
understand. "We've
been caught out a little." He
said it hadn't been easy for Australian manufacturers to suddenly gear up
to meet the high demand. Mr
Murray said the company didn't keep high stocks, but had a small supply on
stand-by for emergency situations. There is no alternative to the product.
A
fresh supply of 15,000 units was expected in New Zealand next week. That
would last for about two months at current demand levels. Mr
Caves said he was concerned there would be increasing numbers of drug
outages unless there were improvements in the way drugs were ordered. He
said in another recent example pharmacists ran out of glicazide, a drug
used particularly among elderly people to manage blood sugar levels in
non-insulin dependent diabetes. There
was a problem with one batch, and without any stocks in reserve, the
supplier had sourced an alternative, "that we think is all
right", Mr Caves said. "There
are a lot of reasons for outages, and just-in-time ordering is a key. "Nobody
makes enough to be able to afford to hold vast stocks. We lose money on
some of these medicines, so we are not going to hold any more than we have
to. "The
wholesalers make their standard small margin and like to be efficient with
turnover." Drug
buying agency Pharmac chief executive Wayne McNee said he was aware of the
supply shortage, but there was nothing Pharmac had done that would have
influenced the situation. Copyright
© 2002 Global Action on Aging
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