SEOUL, October 16 (AJP) -South Korea will tighten checks on prescriptions and illegal sales of the ADHD drug methylphenidate ahead of next month's college entrance exam, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety said Friday.
Methylphenidate prescriptions reached 58.05 million pills in the first half of this year, up 12.1 percent from a year earlier. People aged 19 or younger accounted for 28.81 million, or nearly half of the total.
The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety will inspect medical institutions from Oct. 19 through Nov. 18, the day before the College Scholastic Ability Test, focusing on clinics visited by young patients receiving large amounts of the drug.
The inspections will look for excessive prescribing, failures to report transactions involving controlled substances and discrepancies between reported and actual inventories. Cases considered medically unjustified after expert review may be referred for investigation.
The ministry will also monitor social media and online communities for illegal sales promoted with phrases such as "study drug" or "concentration drug." It had identified 1,882 illegal sales and brokerage posts through September.
Methylphenidate is a psychotropic drug used to treat attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. The ministry has separately run a public campaign stressing that the medication is not a drug that makes students study better.
"Buying ADHD medication online without a prescription or taking medication prescribed to a family member or acquaintance are both violations of the narcotics law," an MFDS official said.
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