BHUBANESWAR: A day after Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik ordered a Crime Branch probe into fake Covid-19 drug trade, the agency’s Special Task Force (STF) has launched an investigation into the matter.
The STF officers held a meeting with the officials of Directorate of Drugs Control on Tuesday and reviewed the investigation carried out so far.
All the aspects including from where the fake Covid-19 drugs were procured will be looked into and further action initiated accordingly, they said.The Chief Minister issued the direction after the Department of Health and Family Welfare confirmed that Favipiravir tablets seized from two wholesale medicine stores in Cuttack last week were fake.
Seizures of fake medicines were made at Balangir, Jharsuguda, Sambalpur, Rourkela, Kalahandi and Bhubaneswar, following the recovery of the drugs from Cuttack on June 10. In April, the government had constituted a State-level committee headed by Crime Branch ADG YK Jethwa to prevent hoarding and black marketing of the essential Covid-19 supplies in Odisha.