The Indian Pharmaceutical Alliance (IPA), which consists of 20 major pharmaceutical companies in the country, in yet another initiative has constituted a Quality Forum (QF).  The main focus of the QF is to attain Quality Excellence, and thereby address various regulatory issues faced by the Indian pharmaceutical industry.

To this end, the IPA, jointly with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the European Medicines Agency (EMA), the Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) and the CDSCO, and McKinsey & Company as Knowledge Partner has planned a first major technical conference Towards Excellence in Quality in Mumbai on February 23, 2016.

The IPA is committed to working with the US FDA and other regulators to resolve all issues related to quality.  In this endeavour, it is fully supported by CEOs of all major companies.  The IPA is confident that the Indian pharmaceutical industry can overcome this challenge with appropriate guidance, periodic dialogue and support of the regulators.

The IPA believes that its members’ goal of maximizing market share is in sync with the regulators’ goal of ensuring access to quality medicines for its citizens. Hence, working together, we can be more effective and achieve the desired results, said IPA secretary general DG Shah.

As the IPA is committed to strengthening India’s drug regulatory regime and making the education at pharmacy colleges more relevant to the industry’s current needs, it has offered 30 seats to the CDSCO and 20 seats to the pharmacy colleges at the conference.

Its earlier initiatives of the Campaign against Spurious Drugs (2000) to identify and prosecute manufacturers and distributors of spurious drugs and constituting an Intellectual Property Cell (2009) to pro-actively challenge secondary patents at the pre-grant stage have made significant impact on curtailing spurious medicines and ensuring quality of patents. They are up and running.