CII National Committee on Drugs and Pharma oppose pharma policy

Mumbai, July 18 (UNI) Ajay Piramal, Chairman - Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) National Committee on Drugs and Pharmaceuticals and Chairman, Nicholas Piramal India Ltd highlighted some of the pharmaceutical industry's concerns regarding the proposed National Pharmaceutical Policy and regulatory aspects like price control, following an interactive session of the CII National Committee on Drugs and Pharmaceuticals held here today.

Mr Piramal told mediapersons that any suden regulatory stocks like increased price control would be detrimental to the industry and the economy. In addition to the 74 existing drugs and formulations, 354 more drugs would be brought under the Drugs and Pharmaceutical Committee Organisation (DPCO), now.

''In the current scenario, the healthy competition between pharma companies has already given way to reasonable pricing. In fact, drug prices are generally going down per year, not up, so there seems to be no reason for intervention by the Union Government,'' said Piramal.

''Instead of creating a scenario where the industry's growth is fettered by over regulation, it would be better to allow market forces to determine prices'', Mr Piramal stressed.

The Pharma industry has already witnessed a decline in overall growth rates from five per cent to eight per cent on account of factors like implementation of Value Added Tax (VAT), increased investment in Research&Development (R&D) required to develop new products under the patent regime and the spurious drugs that hamper the profits of legitimate companies. New product launches have also visibly reduced, he added.

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