Fixing drug prices helped consumers save Rs 5K cr: Govt

Consumers have saved nearly Rs 5,000 crore on account of the government fixing the prices of medicines under the Drugs Price Control Order (DPCO) 2013, government said on Friday.

It had fixed ceiling prices of 530 scheduled formulations in accordance with DPCO 2013 including medicines for diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and cancer till February 29, 2016, Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers Ananth Kumar said in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha.

Thereafter, till June 2016, government has further fixed the prices of 404 formulations including 39 medicines for heart diseases, 18 HIV/AIDS drugs and 39 anti-cancer formulations, he added.

"The total saving to consumers as a result of price control under DPCO 2013 is nearly Rs 4,988 crore," Kumar said.

Prices of over 530 formulations were fixed under National List of Essential Medicines (NLEM) 2011 and 404 medicines under the revised NLEM 2015 under DPCO 2013, which was notified on March 10, 2016.

"These scheduled formulations include a wide range of antibiotics also. Besides the government has also opened 375 Jan Aushadhi stores countrywide to provide quality medicines at affordable prices to the masses," the minister said.

In a separate reply, Minister of State (MoS) in Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers Mansukh Lal Mandaviya said the government has also capped the maximum retail price of 106 non scheduled formulations, including 84 cardiovascular formulations and 22 antibiotics, under Para 19 of DPCO, 2013.

"The government is also engaged in the exercise of fixing the ceiling prices of the remaining scheduled formulations in revised Schedule-I for which market data is available," he added.