|
|
No plan to produce H1N1 anti-viral New Delhi, December 15 Reason - the government thinks it would be “economically unviable” for Central Public Sector Undertakings to enter into production at this stage. The shocking admission forms part of the government’s statements before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Chemicals and Fertilisers, which has castigated the ministry for its economics-driven approach when evolving strategies to counter the pandemic. In its report submitted to Parliament today on the “production and availability of drugs to deal with swine flu”, the committee has asked the government to entrust one of its PSUs to produce Oseltamivir, a life-saving drug. Expressing apprehensions on Oseltamivir going out of bounds for the common man, considering the government has “given liberty to private pharma firms to sell the anti-viral at a price that is within reasonable limit,” the panel has called for urgent pricing regulation. “Reasonable limit is a very vague term which could be conveniently manipulated by the pharma companies for their gains. Chances of swine flu medicines becoming costlier cannot be ruled out in view of high volatility of the prices of raw materials, currently being imported from China,” the committee observes.Right now, India is procuring Oseltamivir (stockpile of four crore capsules is being maintained) from six pharma firms - Hetero Drugs, Cipla, Ranbaxy, Strides Aerolab (which produce the drug locally); Roche (imports the drug) and NATCO, which only has formulation capability for the capsules. That explains the panel’s worries: “We dread a situation where the private sector is not able to produce Oseltamivir or curtails its production and the government has no production of its own.” Alarm has also been raised on the front of raw material - Shikmic acid - production and availability, for which India is dependent on China. Although the ICMR and the NIPER, Mohali, are developing alternatives to produce Oseltamivir, there has been no headway yet. There are apprehensions that China might consider a ban on Shikmic acid exports. Already, there is evidence of Shikmic acid prices exhibiting high volatility between $45 and $475 per kg. The House committee has now exhorted the government to make funds available to research organisations to find alternatives to Shikmic acid. It has, however, noted the failures of the government: “It is a matter of serious concern that the Department of Pharmaceuticals has not kept track of the means adopted by the USA and Mexico to cope with the availability of Shikmic acid or measures taken by them to find alternative routes for the production of Oseltamivir. We suggest a study be conducted to gauge the dependency of other countries upon China for Shikmic acid.”
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
| HOME PAGE | |
Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir |
Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs |
Nation | Opinions | | Business | Sports | World | Letters | Chandigarh | Ludhiana | Delhi | | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
