-The Telegraph Call to govt to adopt 'cost-based' control The 30 per cent cap on profit margins imposed by India’s drug pricing authority on 42 anti-cancer drugs will have a limited impact on patients’ expenses because many of these medicines’ prices remain “prohibitive”, a network of patients’ rights groups said on Saturday. The All India Drug Action Network (Aidan) said the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority’s cap on profit margins in effect “legitimises” the...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The government has capped trade margins of 42 cancer drugs at 30% expanding the span of price control to curtail undue profiteering by chemists and drug stockists on various medicines which were so far outside price regulation. The move is expected to bring major relief to around 1.5 million cancer patients in India reeling under exponentially high treatment cost leading to heavy out-of-pocket expenditure. In a detailed...

-The Hindu Business Line The Ayushman Bharat programme must aim to reverse poverty caused by healthcare expenses The state of India’s healthcare system is somewhat dichotomous — the country is a global supplier of life-saving, affordable and good quality generic medicines, yet lakhs of families are driven into poverty because they are forced to spend much of their earnings and savings on medications to treat chronic and life-threatening diseases. The poor, particularly,...

-The Times of India and other agencies WASHINGTON: United States President Donald Trump has promised to bring the cost of prescription drugs in the country "way down" and let other countries pay more for these medicines. If effected, Trump's new policy on prescription drugs, dicussed with his cabinet at the White House on Monday, could have grave implications for India. The US has long had a grouse with India over its patent...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: India's drug pricing rules allow companies to inflate the maximum retail prices of medicines, including life-saving drugs, costing patients thousands of additional rupees while offering slices of the profits to stockists, chemists, and hospitals. Quotations received by hospitals from drug companies' representatives offering discounts on maximum retail prices (MRPs) of medicines provide what some doctors and patients' rights advocates say is fresh evidence for excessive profiteering in India's...