The Department of Pharmaceuticals has been trying to curb the practice of bribing doctors by the pharmaceutical companies for more than three years now but with no success. It had called two meetings of the industry associations last year and OPPI was asked to draft a common code of marketing practices for the entire industry. Nothing could be finalised in those two meetings. Even in the meeting called by the Department in December last year, no decision could be arrived at as major differences cropped up among the industry associations, especially between the big and small players. It is not totally unexpected. The main reason why the pharma companies are not cooperating is the intense competition amongst themselves to push each one’s products and that is not possible without the support of doctors. The practice of bribing doctors to create more prescriptions has been going on for many years and it may be difficult for the Department alone to eliminate the practice that fast. It is well known that a major part of the cost of prescription drugs is due to the loading of the promotional expenditure on their prices. That needs to be controlled for the public good. Today, more than 80 per cent of the drugs marketed in the country are outside the purview of the DPCO as production of a large number of the 74 controlled drugs has been discontinued by the pharma companies since 1995. Hundreds of drugs subsequently approved by the DCGI for marketing in the country also remains outside price control as there was no serious attempt on the part of the chemicals ministry to evaluate their essentiality and include them under DPCO.
Now, to what extend DoP can force the pharmaceutical companies and their associations to check the practice is some thing not very clear. Because, this is largely a deal in secrecy between the pharma companies and the medical practitioners. If the pharmaceutical companies do not cooperate, DoP needs to work out a strategy to monitor this unethical practice and take some punitive measures. Medical practitioners and their associations have also not been very supportive to DoP's initiative in this regard. However, Medical Council of India has been making some efforts to curb the practice amongst the doctors for some time now. It has come out with a code of ethics for doctors prohibiting them from receiving gifts, travel facilities, hospitality, monetary grants, endorsements, etc. Medical practitioners are thus prohibited from receiving favours from pharma or healthcare companies under any pretext. MCI has the powers to regulate the practice of medical professionals and take action against them. But, the question is how the MCI will be able to monitor the conduct of lakhs of doctors spread across the country. Yet, one can hope that MCI's new ethical code and DoP's determination to scrutinize the promotional expenditures of pharma companies should bring about an end to this unholy nexus soon.