The Hill News

Drug shortages are a real and serious crisis in health care with critical consequences to patient care.  It is bad and it is getting worse. Some essential drugs that patients urgently need are just not available.
 
More than 80 percent of hospitals say that drug shortages have caused delays in treating patients, according to a recent survey by the American Hospital Association.  The most serious shortages include the drugs used to put patients to sleep for surgery, relieve vomiting, pain, and anxiety, treat infection, correct electrolyte abnormalities, feed patients intravenously who can’t eat, and to treat cancer. 
 
For some of these patients -- especially those with cancer, newborns and children â€" the situation is critical.  Drugs used to treat and possibly cure cancers are in scarce supply or not available at all.   Life-saving drugs needed by newborns are in critical short supply or unavailable. Unfortunately there are few, if a! ny, acceptable alternatives for either of these situations.
 
And so far, the crisis only seems to be getting worse.

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