Any move that makes healthcare affordable for patients is welcome, but drug price controls aren’t the only solution. The Government can’t expect the industry to bear the full burden of making medicines affordable, while abdicating its responsibility towards public health. The Government should speedily come out with a policy for universal healthcare coverage (UHC) to address the needs of the poor. The pharma industry is a highly regulated one and drugs account for only 15 per cent of total healthcare costs, which means that there are other costs which also need to be regulated. Apart from drug price control, the Government needs to also address other more serious issues like the sale of spurious and sub-standard drugs in the country. The price ceiling formula should have been based on a weighted average of prices and not a simple average as has been done. The simple, average formula fails to create a level playing field between integrated companies with end-to-end infrastructure and others that are virtual companies with hardly any overhead costs. The Government, in fact, needs to incentivise investment in manufacturing and R&D.
– Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Chairman & Managing Director, Biocon