This move will make essential medicines more affordable
Drug prices will be curbed to make essential medicines more affordable
New Delhi/Mumbai: India has capped the prices of 36 drugs, including those used to treat infections and diabetes, in its latest move to make essential medicines more affordable, a senior official of India’s drug pricing authority said. The medicines join a list of 348 drugs deemed essential and that are therefore subject to price caps, covering up to 30 percent of the total medication sold in a country where less than 20 percent of people are covered by health insurance.
“This is a straight-forward, most predictable, overdue action which has been done by us,” the official at the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority said, declining to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter.Global and Indian drugmakers have been hit in India by wide-ranging government-imposed price reductions over the last year. Industry officials say prices in the country are already among the lowest in the world, but the cost of drugs is overwhelmingly covered by patients themselves. India in July capped the prices of more than 100 drugs that are not part of the essential medicines list.
The pharmaceutical industry has challenged the move in court. Indian drugmakers, including Cipla, Ranbaxy, and Cadila are among the companies that will be affected by the latest decision, research firm AIOCD Pharmasoft-tech AWACS said.
Cipla said the implementation of the new price rules has impacted its domestic business and the company continues to take measures to mitigate its effect.
( Source : reuters )
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