NGO wants drug prices regulated

The Drug Action-Forum (DAF) of Karnataka, an NGO, has urged the Union government to take immediately take steps to regulate the price of medicines in the country.

DAF president Dr Gopal Dabade told reporters here on Wednesday that the escalating prices of medicines has made treatment beyond the reach of the common man and accused the Union government of failing to regulate the prices.

An NGO All India Drug Action Network (AIDAN) has already had a legal battle against the Centre at the Apex Court in 2003.

Dabade pointed out that in its last hearing, the Supreme Court had remarked, “These days, the medicines prescribed by doctors are beyond the reach of the common man. An antibiotic would not cost less than Rs 50. According to a yardstick fixed, a person who earns Rs 32 is not considered as living below the poverty line (BPL). So he has to starve for two days to buy an antibiotic.”

The SC has directed the Centre to decide on the final drug pricing policy. But, indicated that they would prefer the government to go by the 1995 DPCO (drug prices control order) cost plus mechanism of fixing price caps.

Dabade said, the Centre had formed a GoM (Group of Ministers) headed by Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar to fix the drug price. Accordingly, the GoM had proposed fixing the 348 essential medicines based on the Weighted Average Price (WAP) of brands having a 1 per cent market share.

He said that this is a market-based mechanism and goes entirely against the aspirations of the Supreme Court. Citing an example, Dr Dabade said, a tablet Atorvastatin 10 mg is commonly used medicine to control high blood pressure. There are around 60 brands in the Indian market manufactured by different companies with varying prices.

The most costly brand sells for Rs 10 per tablet and the lowest is just priced for 90 paise. The WAP of brands having over 1 per cent for the medicine would work out to Rs 7.50 which means the medicine would cost 833 per cent more than the cheapest one.

The DAF has demanded that the Centre adopt cost-based pricing mechanism so the price rise could be controlled and medicines could become affordable to maximum number of people.