Hospitals and human rights commissioner raise alarms over antibiotic shortage in Poland

Hospitals in Poland are warning that the country is experiencing a shortage of vital pharmaceuticals, particularly antibiotics containing penicillin and amoxicillin, that patients should be taking after being discharged. There are concerns that hospitals may also soon run out.

Poland’s human rights commissioner has also expressed concern about the situation. While children infected with streptococci are most affected, shortages also concern vaccines, diabetes and allergy medication.

“We contacted pharmacies and wholesalers. They all talk about a total lack of antibiotics,” Lidia Stopyra, head of paediatrics at the Stefan Żeromski Specialist Hospital in Kraków, told radio station TOK FM. “We are in a deadlock.”

Health minister Adam Niedzielski said he had not heard of any shortage of medicines. Following the TOK FM publication, Marcin Wiącek, the human rights commissioner, requested information on how the health ministry plans to resolve the issue.

“From the information that has reached the office, it appears that hospitals are raising the alarm that there is a shortage of very important medicines,” his office wrote in a statement. These include “penicillin and amoxicillin, which are basically not available in pharmacies”.

This is the second time the commissioner has intervened with the health ministry on this issue this year.

The shortage of antibiotics for children infected with the streptococcus bacteria has been particularly difficult, and several children infected with the bacteria have already died in Kraków, reports the local edition of Gazeta Wyborcza daily.

The pharmaceuticals in question include Ospen, containing penicillin, and Duomox, Ospomax and Amotax, containing amoxicillin.

According to gdziepolek.pl, a website that helps patients find the nearest pharmacy stocking medication that they are seeking, Ospen in various doses is available in no more than 17% of pharmacies. The availability of Duomox, Ospomax and Amotax varies from single-digit numbers to almost full availability depending on the formulation.

“The problem is that now…I write a prescription and the parents come back to me an hour later because they can’t get the medication anywhere,” Stopyra said in a separate interview with Gazeta Wyborcza. “The lucky ones are those who manage to find a pharmacy that at least has a different dose of the drug available.”

Stopyra fears that the shortage might soon affect hospitals as well, as the drugs are not available even at wholesalers.

“We have supplies for a few days, and what happens after that, I don’t know,” she said.

The shortages are a continuation of supply chain issues that arose during the pandemic. According to Poland’s Supreme Pharmaceutical Chamber, the lack of medicines affects countries across Europe due to the pharmaceutical industry being dependent on production in China and India.

“The pandemic and then the closure of the port in Odessa meant that the substances needed to produce antibiotics did not reach Poland. As a result, there is beginning to be a shortage of medicines,” Konrad Madejczyk, spokesman for the Supreme Pharmaceutical Chamber, told Gazeta Wyborcza.

Main image credit: Michelle Leman / Pexels 

Alicja Ptak

Alicja Ptak is senior editor at Notes from Poland and a multimedia journalist. She previously worked for Reuters.