More North Koreans are consuming homemade drugs now than before the coronavirus pandemic, multiple sources told Daily NK on Friday.
Prior to COVID, North Koreans could go to local markets or home businesses specializing in drug sales to buy fever medicine, pain medicine, digestive medicine, diarrhea medicine and other remedies. After the start of the pandemic, the authorities have been strongly cracking down on unlicensed drug sales, forcing people to turn to pharmacies for drugs.
For ordinary North Koreans, however, purchasing medicinal remedies in pharamacies is exceedly difficult.
For one, there is a massive gap between supply and demand, which has led to a substantial amount of corruption in drug-related transactions. Pharmacies pilfer fever and pain medicines like aspirin or paracetamol and antibiotics such as amoxicillin to sell to drug merchants for prices higher than state-set prices. Or they make customers pay the difference between state-set prices and market-set prices.
In fact, the Central Public Prosecutor’s Office recently launched a nationwide inspection to bust pharmacies that made illegal profits by selling drugs or medical supplies for prices higher than state-set prices or by using illegal means to circulate drugs into the market.
What’s more, pharmacies mostly carry traditional Korean medicines manufactured at North Korean pharmaceutical factories, but many North Koreans dislike such remedies because they lack effectiveness.
PEOPLE REMEDY AILMENTS WITH DANGEROUS HOMEMADE DRUGS
Given this situation, more and more North Koreans are purchasing ingredients to make their own medicines.
Sources in the country told Daily NK that many people are using folk remedies of unproven efficacy, mixing or boiling medicine herbs like bell flower, atractylodes root, white atractylis and willow leaf.
The sources also said there has been a notable recent increase in using narcotics to treat seriously ill patients.
With drug abuse sharply climbing amid the shortage of pharmaceuticals, North Korean authorities launched a special crackdown on narcotics such as opium and methamphetamine in late 2022.
However, government crackdowns have not stopped North Koreans from seeking out narcotics as an alternative to proper medications, and eradicating the phenomenon will likely prove difficult.
In fact, one of the sources who spoke with Daily NK said a sick person in South Pyongan Province immediately lost consciousness and then died last year after receiving an intravenous injection of saline mixed with opium powder.
Even though opium is relatively easy to obtain and people continue to use it as a medicine, the authorities are failing to take proper measures to either restrict it or offer alternatives.
Moreover, as the authorities have provided no guidelines for the use of needles in connection with homemade drugs, North Koreans often reuse needles after boiling them in salt water.
Basically, this means North Koreans are exposed to infections and other health problems from the reuse of medical equipment.
Perhaps out of awareness of the problems arising from the drug shortage, North Korea is emphasizing the domestic production and supply of drugs.
In a Feb. 2 article titled “Let’s Increase the Number and Production Total of Medicines,” the Rodong Sinmun called satisfying the demand for drugs a “critical effort that must be carried out regardless of conditions,” and implored factories making pharmaceuticals and traditional Korean medicines to prospectively secure needed ingredients and supplies for production and manage their operations in a resourceful manner.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
Please direct any comments or questions about this article to dailynkenglish@uni-media.net.
