2 held in Noida for illegally selling black fungus drug

Noida: Two men were nabbed by the Noida police on Saturday night from Sector 62 for allegedly black marketing Amphotericin B, a key medicine for treatment of black fungus infection.

The suspects were identified as Anurag Kumar and Ankit Bhatt, residents of Delhi and Noida Sector 122, respectively. Kumar worked as a supervisor at a store of a pharmacy chain, police said.

“Anurag was using the medicine available at the store as well as at other pharmacies of the chain to sell in the black market,” said Rajneesh Verma, assistant commissioner of police (ACP), zone 1.

According to police officials, the suspects would contact relatives of patients in need of the drug through social media. Amphotericin B injections are in high demand as the cases of black fungus have gone up recently in the National Capital Region.

“The market cost of the medicine starts from ₹2,000 to ₹3,500 and the suspects were selling the injection for as high as ₹16,000,” said the ACP.

The officials said that the suspects would give one or two injections at normal prices but then increase the rates exponentially. The suspects would also target people in need of the drug near hospitals, the officials said, adding that the duo was trying to sell the medicine near a private hospital in Sector 62 when they were caught. Police recovered two injections of Amphotericin B from the suspects.

“They have deleted most customer chats from their phones. But we were still able to retrieve a few. Many photos of the medicine were also found. We also found photos of Remdesivir from Bhatt’s phone. They may be black marketing other medicines as well. But that is under investigation,” said Verma.

The suspects were booked at Sector 58 police station for cheating (Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code) and relevant sections of the Epidemic Act and the Disaster Management Act, police said.