Lindy
I would prefer not to buy drugs made by slave labour in Stalinist North Korea and marketed through a mail box in Calcutta by a man who calls himself "The Doctor", but so far he's the only dealer returning my calls.
People who work at Merck tell me "unofficially" that their unnamed supplier of sinemet (out-sourced) somehow disappeared and is being replaced by another unnamed source and the delays are caused by governments -= the time it takes to get FDA style approval and "even for the packaging".
They changed the packaging?
The story in the street is that the only shortage is a shortage of Merck labels; that Merck's supplier blindsided them and took their pills to another dealer who pays a better cut of the take; and The Doctor says it is the fault of governments such as Australia and the UK where governments push down the price of drugs; and now Merck found a new dealer (I wonder if it is The Doctor?) but governments are delaying the process by wanting inspections and approvals. Must be a dealer who did not need FDA type approval before now.
So is there a shortage? It is supposed to start in March. Or is it just a Merck shortage? Is The Doctor a blessing or a gangster? Who is Merck's new supplier? None of this was foreseen? They just woke up one day and their supplier had gone over to.... China?
The Doctor says the drugs are all available, under different labels; Merck's ex-supplier just changed mules because Merck was taking too much of the cut and squeezing the supplier and the retail street dealers.
They say it was a real blow-up between the Australian government and Merck that got the Aussies upgraded from "shortage" to "none at all". And here's the cool rumour _ The Doctor says it was the Aussie government who threw them out, partly in anger, partly to avoid that problem of triage we talked about - how to enter a room with 10 Parkies when you only have drugs for 2. The Aussies have lined up non-Merck suppliers to replace Merck. According to The Doctor in Calcutta.
I will now "cease and desist" as my pen-pals like to say, unless some other countries report how they are handling it.
I think I have made my point that it would be useful to have information from sources other than The Doctor. So is there a shortage or a surplus? Did Merck have their phone fixed? Is there anybody there standing near the phone? When it rings, you are supposed to pick up that small part and say hello.