-The Times of India India will, for the first time, put a cap on the maximum price at which essential drugs, like some commonly used anti-AIDS and anti-cancer drugs, besides a horde of painkillers, anti-TB drugs, sedatives, lipid lowering agents and steroids, can be sold in the country. In a landmark decision, a group of ministers (GoM) headed by agriculture minister Sharad Pawar on Thursday cleared the proposal to bring all 348...

-The Times of India In a significant intervention aimed at settling a noisy policy feud, PM Manmohan Singh has asked health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad to sort out differences over the thrust and formulation of the health policy in the 12th plan with Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia. The PM intervened during the full meeting of the Planning Commission on Saturday when Azad took up issues that have led to...

-The Economic Times India's drug price regulator has initiated a process to end the 16-year freedom enjoyed by foreign drug makers to fix the retail price of their imported medicines in the country. The National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has written to the department of pharmaceuticals to amend the Drugs (Prices Control) Order of 1995, its chairman CP Singh told ET. The amendment will allow NPPA to seek details of the methodology adopted...

-The Business Standard State must get out of insulin price-setting The National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority, or NPPA, has turned down the request of drug companies to raise insulin prices. Domestic insulin-makers Biocon and Cadila had argued that the cost of production and packaging had become higher, and multinational corporation Eli Lilly wanted the depreciation in the rupee vis-à-vis the dollar to be factored into the price. The NPPA says it has...

-The Economic Times It's not just the drug regulator, where a parliamentary panel has alleged corruption, failing in its job. Drug regulation across entities that dot this broad landscape is in poor health and ineffective. In May, when a Parliamentary panel, during a routine examination of healthcare regulatory bodies, alleged corruption in the approval of new drugs, it was merely pointing out one symptom. Such symptoms pervade the entire drug regulation landscape,...