Panel To Study Fixed Dose Combinations

The Supreme Court yesterday set up a core group to study the problem of fixed dose combination medicines and report to it. The government had banned some medicines, including Baralgan, last December following an expert committee report obtained by it.

The core group will consist of the drug controller, who will act as its convenor, director general of health services, director general of armed forces medical services and medical experts N H Antia, Naresh Banerjee and Nitya Anand.

The core group idea was recommended by the earlier commission appointed by the court headed by Planning Commission member J S Bajaj to study hazardous drugs. It gave a damning report on the working of the statutory drug committee, and recommended the setting up of the core group.

 

The division bench consisting of Justice J S Verma and Justice B N Kirpal requested the core group to proceed with its work immediately and report to them to enable the court to pass further orders on harmful medicines.

Companies which are affected by the ban orders may transmit relevant materials on their behalf to the core group through the additional solicitor general.

They cannot appear before the group directly.

Meanwhile, three pharmaceutical companies sought permission of the court to export their existing stock to countries which have not banned the medicines. The companies are Hoechst, Cadilla and Tata Pharma.

They submitted that when the December ban was clamped, they already had huge stocks of such medicines and some were in the pipeline.

These combination brands are not banned in Russia and other CIS countries. The annual export to such countries is worth Rs 100 crore. They wanted to be allowed to export the existing stocks to meet their contractual obligations.

The court asked the companies to ensure that there would be no distribution of the medicines within the country and furnish particulars of the stocks, certified by the concerned authorities, within a week. The court will pass further orders regarding these stocks next week.

The court was dealing with a petition filed by the Drug Action Forum, highlighting the harmful drugs manufactured and distributed in the market.

Though the World Health Organisation had recommended some 300 medicines for most common ailments, thousands of hazardous combinations are flooding the market, according to the petition.

The court has been hearing the petition for some time and setting up commissions and passing orders. The government has responded by banning several combination brands.