Panel plans bitter pill for drug firms

A task force set up by the chemicals and fertilisers ministry has suggested that pharma companies should not be allowed to register brands without prior approval from the drug controller.

The suggestion has been made as they often replace an old molecule which is being phased out with a new one and market it under the same brand name.

While companies view this as a saving on further advertising and educational costs, it could mean that a person who thinks he is buying a heart medicine is actually buying one for pain relief.

"Often, the change in the ingredient completely alters the use of the drug. However, companies continue to use the brand name which has been built up because of the recall value," said an industry executive, adding that there were over 300 such cases which had been identified.

The task force to explore options other than price control for achieving the objective of making available life saving drugs at reasonable prices, has also suggested not allowing registration of brands with the registrar of trademarks without clearance from the drug controllers office as a number of drugs with similar sounding names, but with very different uses are available in the market.

For drugs which have not seen any new competition arising over a period of time, a debranding exercise could be considered, under which only generics would be allowed.

On drug pricing, it has suggested that ceiling prices, with built in flexibility linked to the wholesale price index, be fixed for drugs. These ceiling prices could be periodically be reviewed by benchmarking against prices for bulk purchase orders.

The task force has also suggested that the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority and the Directorage General of Health Services be merged and the Drug Price Control Order be made an Act.