The Hindu Business Line : Half-dose will not do

Medicines and politics make for a heady cocktail. But the opposition brewing from several Ministries to the National Pharmaceutical Policy 2006 does seem justified. The draft policy sets out to achieve the Centre's agenda of making medicines affordable and accessible, but meanders off course. The opposition is largely to the policy's move to tighten controls on the prices of all the 354 drugs on the National List of Essential Medicines. This would not just set the clock back on the Centre's vision of gradually reducing the span of price-control on medicines. It would also move away from the promise of a regime that would only monitor prices. And medicines being an emotive subject, the thought of reduced control on medicine prices evokes a strong response, though not always well thought through.

But drug prices are just one part of the illness that plagues healthcare delivery in India. Government hospitals are over-burdened, corporate facilities are highly priced, and the less said about rural primary healthcare centres the better. And the system still cries out for a dynamic health insurance. Not that pharmaceutical companies should be given a free-run on pricing; there must be a monitoring system to curb unhealthy trends. But tightening the grip on medicine prices could result in drug companies skirting control by changing the composition of the drugs. Worse, if the drug under government control turns out not to be lucrative for the company, it will simply exit the category.

Much as one may balk at this, governments need to accept that pharma companies are business-houses with an eye on the bottom-line. Tightening screws on prices also means that companies are left with little money for research. While the drug companies are still far from showing breakthrough drugs for the concessions they have got this far, it is also true that they faced no compulsion to invest in innovative research till 2005. Only last year did the Centre amend norms to protect product-patents, making it difficult for companies to tick merely by making copycat drugs. The Centre would do well not to rock the boat for drug companies at a time when competition has driven down drug prices and product patent has raised the research bar. Indeed, the Government must incentivise research, giving sops to companies that employ a certain number of scientists or invest a specified amount in R&D.

To make medicines affordable, the Centre will have to improve its procurement or think of differential pricing for drugs supplied through government channel. But medicines will become accessible only when supply sources are plenty and run professionally. The Government needs to standardise, regulate and monitor operations and prices across the healthcare sector — pharmaceutical industry, hospitals, doctors, diagnostic-laboratories and insurance providers. Making the pharmaceutical industry the only whipping boy will at best be a half-dose for an illness that afflicts the entire healthcare industry. And half-measures will certainly not help bring affordable medicines to the people.

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