Making medicine more affordable

The issue of drug price control and pharmaceutical policy has been a major subject of discussion since long considering the rising drug prices against the universal effort in making the drug more affordable. In question to these a seminar on “Pharmaceutical Pricing and Regulatory Framework for Affordable Prices” is under its way here in the capital to discuss related issues.

The seminar aims to put forward all issues including the price control of all generic drugs as the List of Essential Medicines and at the same time the impact of this on the pharmaceutical industry. Besides the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) and the Department of Chemicals and Petrochemicals, the seminar invites all stakeholders, international experts, and policymakers in a sight to understand effective price control mechanism.

The Seminar

The Government of India after taking into consideration the drug prices and the present health care system especially in rural areas felt the need to address the issue at large. This is for the first time such seminar has been well thought-out since the modification of 1986-Drug Policy in 1994.

The Seminar will focus on various aspects of price regulatory mechanisms, affordability of drugs and understand the price regulatory system of different countries.

Union Minister of State for Chemicals & Fertilizers & Parliamentary Affairs B K Handique will inaugurate the seminar along with Minister of Chemicals & Fertilizers & Steel Ram Vilas Paswan.

Apart from major India based pharmaceutical companies, government representatives of drug regulatory, Drug Controllers, WHO, Donors, International and National NGOs, Research Representatives of Consumer Associations, Representatives of Research Organisations, experts from USA, MIT, Boston University, London School of Economics and regulators from South Africa and Canada will also be present at the conference.

Subject of Concern

As the government had earlier made changes in price control policy by bringing certain drugs to the regulatory framework, it did not have much positive impact on the availability of essential medicines. Hence to make medicine more affordable it is essential to bring almost all drugs to the frame work.

On the backdrop of newly introduced product patent regime in India which bars other pharmaceutical companies to copy and produce the same drug at cheaper price too a worrying factor for public interest as such act can increase the price of a particular drug due to monopoly.

On the other side, price control policy for all drugs can have significant impact on industry which is lobbying against such firm policy. Though earlier the government of India had given relaxation to pharmaceutical industry with a voluntary price reduction through a cut in trade margins of essential lifesaving drugs, not much improvement in the availability has been noticed so far.

Besides the above objectives, the prime goal for the government should be to ensure availability of essential medicines to people not only at reasonable price but also to ensure the quality as per the world standardisation is maintained in the drugs. Simultaneously, in order to bring prices reasonable, the government should make effort to enhance the production of drugs with introducing new technologies and new medicines.