Man buys medicine with the help of a pharmacy sales person in Chongqing municipality, Southwest China, July 21, 2014. [Photo/IC]

A survey shows about 70 percent of urban families have a medicine chest at home, but most of the medicines will expire without being used. As a result, a vicious chain has emerged, in which people purchase the expired medicines and then sell them for use in the rural regions. Gmw.cn commented:

Some of the expired medicines are sold directly to the rural clinics that mainly serve senior citizens whose adult children have left the villages to work in cities; some are packaged again, given a new label and production date, then sold to relatively bigger rural hospitals. Such medicines are a risk to rural residents.

The problem has multiple causes. First, there is no legal channel for recycling expired medicines, so some families sell their expired medicines to illegal "recycling" businesses. Second, as most of the young villagers migrate to cities to work, those left behind are mainly old people or children, who are vulnerable to being exploited by the unscrupulous medicine dealers and medical practitioners.

A no less important cause is that health authorities have very strict regulatory measures with the clinics and pharmacies in cities, but exert hardly any regulatory control over their rural counterparts. That's why some rural clinics dare to sell expired medicines without changing the packaging.

Stricter regulatory measures are needed to change the situation. In cities, the illegal chain of "recycling" expired medicines should be cut, and a legal one established, so that people know how to safely deal with their expired medicines.

In rural regions, health authorities should strengthen regulatory measures and put all the clinics under control, so that they no longer dare to sell expired medicines.

The "left-behind" old people and children in rural regions are vulnerable groups and they need better, or at least equal, protection.