-The Indian Express Prime Minister Narendra Modi's US visit is likely to throw up highly contentious intellectual property rights issues. Indeed, for the last several years, US drug majors and their European counterparts have lobbied hard to demonise the Indian patent regime. But the government must continue to defend the law and stand its ground. Particularly since our own industrial moguls have caved in and are less vocal about their opposition...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Faced with the scary prospect of losing lives to simple infections in the future, India is finally waking up to the dangers of reckless antibiotic use. The Indian Medical Association, a pan-India voluntary organization of doctors, will on Sunday launch a nationwide awareness programme on overuse of these live-savers, a practice that has led to emergence of drug-resistant organisms. IMA will also ask fellow practitioners to...

-Deccan Chronicle ONGOLE: After fluoride, it has been found that ground water in 46 villages under Peddacherlapallil, Chandrasekhara Puram and Chimakurthy mandals in Prakasam district contains uranium. This was revealed in a chemical analysis test conducted by the rural water supply department at a testing lab in Hyderabad. Groundwater in Diwakarapuram village under P.C. Palli mandal contains the highest traces of uranium, 48.863 parts per billion (ppb), and in Hariramarajapalem Colony it is...

-The Times of India MUMBAI: In a move that will disappoint many patients, the government has withdrawn certain powers of the drug pricing regulator that allowed it to cap prices of widely prescribed anti-diabetes, Cancer, HIV, tuberculosis and cardiac medicines. The National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) said it is withdrawing "with immediate effect" - a guideline that had allowed it to put price caps on crucial medicines - to comply with a...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: A government agency has blocked its own pledge to impose price control on more medicines by withdrawing guidelines that it had used in July this year to cap prices of drugs used to treat diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. The National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has withdrawn the guidelines issued under Paragraph 19 of the Drug Price Control Order that it had used in July this year to cap...