LAMJUNG: The Lamjung District Community Hospital (LDCH) is facing a crunch of free medication in the recent days.

The hospital is facing the shortage of 72 types of free medicines provided by the government, affecting the patients, according to Yuvraj Devkota, Chief Administrator of the hospital.

“The hospital has already used most of the free medicines and the remaining ones are those with low usage frequency,” said Chief Devkota, adding that this lack of medicines is forcing the patients arriving for treatment at the hospital to conduct the check-up there and buy medicines elsewhere.

The hospital has been providing services to the patients from far-flung areas of the district.

According to the LDCH, government had been releasing annual budget to procure medicines needed in the hospital, however, it had failed to do so this year resulting in the inability to provide free medicines to those who are in need of them.

Recently, all the health related budget has been provided directly to the local levels causing the current predicament, informed Devkota. He further asserted that the hospital has been working to manage the free medicines.

Due to the recent drop in temperature, the hospital has been visited by an increasing number of patients with common cold, fever, Pneumonia, and asthma, reaching upto 200 patients per day, informed the hospital.