Dear OpenAI Team,As a pharmacy assistant, I am reaching out to report a critical safety loophole regarding how ChatGPT handles medical queries from general users. Daily, patients come to my pharmacy demanding specific medications because ChatGPT “diagnosed” them and recommended a treatment plan—including highly restricted and dangerous drugs—without clinical examination or full medical history.The Dangerous Reality in Pharmacies:Prescribing Controlled/Narcotic Drugs: ChatGPT recently recommended Calmepam (a Benzodiazepine)—a potent, highly regulated tranquilizer—to a user, even specifying the dosage.Risky Advice for Critical Conditions: The AI has previously calculated active medication dosages for a stroke patient.Ineffective Disclaimers: ChatGPT’s standard text disclaimer at the end of the response is practically useless. The patient ignores the warning once they see a concrete drug name and dosage, then pressures pharmacy staff to dispense it.Omission of Fatal Side Effects: When recommending these high-risk drugs, the AI failed to warn the user about life-threatening risks, such as respiratory depression.My Urgent Proposals for OpenAI:Strict OTC (Over-the-Counter) Restriction: ChatGPT must be strictly prohibited from suggesting prescription-only medications, scheduled drugs (controlled substances), or specific drug brands to general users. It should only discuss basic OTC medications (like vitamins or simple analgesics).Absolute Refusal to Set Dosages: The AI must completely refuse to calculate or suggest dosages for critical cases (like stroke or cardiac patients).Mandatory Hard-Stop for Clinical Symptoms: If a user inputs severe symptoms, ChatGPT should immediately generate a hard-stop response directing them to a hospital, rather than listing potential active ingredients.Relying on a text disclaimer while providing a literal prescription layout to an untrained patient is a severe risk to public health. I urge you to implement these medical guardrails immediately.
Best regards,[abdulrahman masry]
Pharmacy Assistant