The much awaited national pharmacovigilance programme, is expected to begin in 10 medical colleges across the country from July 1 this year. The first phase of the programme will be launched in 10 of the 300 medical colleges in the country and the DCGI plans to further extend it to 40 other colleges by next year and 60 the next. DCGI said that by 2014, all the 300 medical colleges will be participating in the national pharmacovigilence programme.

The national level pharmacovigilence programme will have a two pronged approach and will be targeted for five years initially. In the budgetary provisions the pharmacovigilence programme was granted with Rs 85 lakh against the expectation of Rs 1.5 crore. This programme was supposed to be launched earlier in the month of April but it had repeatedly got delayed due problems in the Union Health Ministry. The DCGI expressed that funding is the most important aspect right now for the success and development this programme. Almost 50 per cent of the allotted money will be used on HR to increase the manpower since its an issue that's been haunting the DCGI's office from the past several years.

The programme will be run in three units that comprises of the medical colleges, other institutes and CDSCO. AIIMS will act as the main centre for the national pharmacovigilence programme, whereas the CDSCO will be providing funds, manpower, training etc to the AIIMS and other institutes involved in this programme. This programme will be started in 10 medical colleges this year.

Speaking about the reason behind choosing medical colleges for the implementation of this programme DCGI said that they were the best choice since they have a systematised data bank on various subjects. Moreover, every medical student have to study pharmacovigilence as a subject in their curriculum and hence are well versed with its principles. The DCGI's office through the CDSCO's zonal and sub-zonal offices will be funding these medical colleges with required infrastructure, training, etc. The DCGI stressed on the need to ensure that each medical college should have their own pharmacovigilence cell. He also invited private institutes and other government aided programmes to participate in this national pharmacovigilence programme for better understanding and success at national level.