{"id":26131,"date":"2024-08-28T01:52:52","date_gmt":"2024-08-27T20:22:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=26131"},"modified":"2025-04-07T23:53:23","modified_gmt":"2025-04-07T18:23:23","slug":"combination-drugs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/combination-drugs\/","title":{"rendered":"What are combination drugs?"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><strong>What are FDCs?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Fixed-dose combination (FDC) drugs are medications that combine two or more <strong>active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs)<\/strong> in a single dosage form, such as a <strong>pill, capsule, or injection.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>These drugs are often prescribed for conditions requiring multiple medications, such as<strong> tuberculosis, diabetes, and hypertension<\/strong>, to enhance patient compliance by reducing the number of pills taken daily.<\/li>\n<li><strong>The rationale for the Ban:<\/strong> The banned FDCs were deemed &#8220;irrational&#8221; by the central government, as they do not provide any additional therapeutic benefits.\n<ul>\n<li>The combinations in these FDCs may involve ingredients that either do not work synergistically or include unnecessary components that do not require simultaneous administration.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Benefits:<\/strong> FDCs can improve patient compliance, especially for chronic diseases where multiple medications are required.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Risks:<\/strong> Some FDCs may include unnecessary components, leading to patients consuming drugs they don&#8217;t need.\n<ul>\n<li>For example,<strong> Cheston Cold includes paracetamol, cetirizine, and phenylephrine,<\/strong> which are not necessary for treating bacterial infections but are used for managing cold symptoms.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Banned FDCs:<\/strong> The recent ban includes various drug combinations:\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Gastrointestinal treatments:<\/strong> Enzyme combinations for digestive issues.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Anti-allergy treatments:<\/strong> Combinations of levocetirizine with nasal decongestants, and cough syrups with mucus-breaking properties.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Skin treatments:<\/strong> FDCs like menthol with aloe vera, and silver sulfadiazine with antiseptics.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Migraine and menstrual pain:<\/strong> Combinations for treating migraines and menstrual cramps.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Erectile dysfunction:<\/strong> Combinations involving sildenafil (Viagra) with other drugs affecting blood vessels and muscles.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Concerns with FDCs:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Overuse of antibiotics:<\/strong> Some FDCs include combinations of antibiotics, leading to their overuse and contributing to the growing issue of <strong>antibiotic resistance<\/strong>. This occurs when bacteria become resistant to commonly used antibiotics, necessitating stronger or higher doses for treatment.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Lack of therapeutic justification:<\/strong> Many FDCs combine drugs that do not require co-administration, potentially exposing patients to unnecessary medications, which could result in adverse effects.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Avoidance of pricing control:<\/strong> Some pharmaceutical companies create FDCs to circumvent government-imposed price controls on essential medicines. By introducing new combinations, they can set higher prices, undermining efforts to make essential drugs affordable.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Q1. What are antibiotics?<\/h3>\n<p>Antibiotics are medicines that fight bacterial infections in people and animals. They work by killing the bacteria or by making it hard for the bacteria to grow and multiply.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source:<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/explained\/explained-health\/govt-ban-fdc-drugs-cheston-cold-foracet-health-ministry-fever-allergies-aches-9536556\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/explained\/explained-health\/govt-ban-fdc-drugs-cheston-cold-foracet-health-ministry-fever-allergies-aches-9536556\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fixed-dose combination (FDC) drugs are medications that combine two or more active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) in a single dosage form, such as a pill, capsule, or injection.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":26132,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-26131","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}