India, July 11 -- After months of delay and bureaucratic hurdles, Sir JJ Hospital in south Mumbai - the state's largest government-run hospital - has begun implementing the long-anticipated 'zero prescription' policy, which mandates that all prescribed medicines and surgical items be dispensed solely through the hospital's in-house pharmacy, eliminating the need for external purchases.

The policy, announced by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) in November 2023, aims to reduce patients' out-of-pocket expenditure across government-run hospitals and dispensaries in the city. For implementation, hospitals were required to scale up their stock of medicines, antibiotics, and surgical supplies from 1,200 items to over 4,000 items, ma...