The Ministry of Health and Welfare announced plans to tighten drug management and crack down on over-prescription by hospitals on Monday in the face of growing criticism of the government’s management of drug abuse.

At the National Assembly, lawmakers accused the ministry of lax management of narcotics and psychotropic drugs such as propofol. A loophole in the country’s drug management system has left many people addicted to inappropriate drugs, said Rep. Ryu Ji-young of the ruling Saenuri Party at a parliamentary session earlier in the day.

The lawmaker claimed the ministry excluded injectable psychotropic drugs from the drug review system so that medical doctors couldn’t share information on the types and amount of the drugs prescribed for patients.

“DUR, or drug utilization review, is a system that the government adopted to avert the misuse of inappropriate drugs. But questions linger over why it excluded injections from the psychotropic drug category,” said Rep. Ryu.

In a move to crack down on drug abuse, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said it would strengthen the monitoring of drugs by using RFID tags to trace the path the drugs take from the time they are produced to when they are dispensed.

The government plans to urge drug manufacturers to put tiny radio antennas called Radio Frequency Identification on the packages of narcotics and psychotropic drugs allowed for medical use. About 53 types of drugs including propofol, midazolam and ketamine will be put on the must-watch list.

The government will also launch a joint investigation by the police and the prosecution into hospitals that have increased the purchase and prescription of the drugs.

“There are more than 400 hospitals across the country that rapidly increased the purchase of psychotropic drugs by more than 100 percent. Together with investigation authorities, we will press charges on hospitals that violated the law,” health ministry officials said.

Officials said that the supply and usage of psychotropic drugs such as propofol, midazolam and ketamine in medical institution-are on the rise.

According to a report by the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service, the amount of propofol supplied to hospitals, for instance, increased 24.3 percent in 2010 and 12 percent last year. Of the 5.82 million ampoule delivered to medical institutions, only 15 percent of the drug received insurance coverage, officials said.

To combat the misuse of drugs, the government also plans to amend the law to order hospitals and pharmacies to report the amount of narcotics dispensed or sold to health authorities each month.

Propofol has been classified as a psychotropic drug since last year in Korea as an increasing number of people have become addicted to it. Experts say it causes hallucinations and may lead to death if taken in excessive doses. The drug was blamed for the death of pop star Michael Jackson three years ago.

By Cho Chung-un (christory@heraldcorp.com)