Indian Essential Medicine List for Children: Time to Revisit

Background: The majority of the under five mortality rate (U5MR) in India were due to treatable causes and could have been prevented by providing quality medicines. Availability and affordability of medicine can be improved by the introduction of essential medicine concepts. Purpose: The current study was carried out to compare the latest edition of the WHO essential medicine list for children (EMLc) with that of Indian EMLc to determine the need to update the Indian EMLc. Methods: A descriptive observational study was carried out in the Department of Pharmacology of a tertiary care hospital. The latest edition of WHO EMLc (8(th)) was compared with the latest edition of Indian EMLc (1(st)) in terms of inclusion of categories or subcategories, the number of medicines in each category or subcategories, medicines which are present in WHO EMLc but missing in Indian EMLc and vice versa. Results: In total 134 medicines are present in Indian EMLc as compared to 350 medicines in WHO EMLc. The important categories which are completely missing in Indian EMLc are medicines for reproductive health and perinatal care, peritoneal dialysis solution, medicines for mental and behavioral disorders, and medicines for diseases of joints. The important medicines which are not included in Indian EMLc are bedaquilline, delaminid, cefixime, piperacillin+tazobactum, vancomycin, acyclovir, azathioprine, cisplatin, and filgrastim. Important vaccines including rotavirus, cholera, hepatitis, and typhoid vaccine are not mentioned in Indian EMLc. Conclusion: There is an urgent need to update the Indian EMLc in order to promote access to pediatric medicine and facilitate the rational use of medicines.