The Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP)'s Task Force on 'Development of Manufacturing Capabilities in each Medical Vertical in Pharmaceutical Production' has asked the government to review the policies which restrict the distribution and availability of drugs for communicable diseases.

In its recommendations on the communicable diseases vertical, the Task Force in its report, submitted to the government recently, said that the policies which restrict the distribution and availability of drugs for communicable diseases should be reviewed to facilitate easy availability especially in tier II/III cities and rural areas. Besides, it also recommended that quality control must be ensured and the available drugs should meet the prescribed standards.

The Task Force, constituted by the DoP in December 2014 under the chairmanship of secretary, DoP, further recommended that the list of APIs, which are in short supply or not manufactured in India may be drawn up and special incentives be offered to manufacturers to start manufacturing these APIs in India. List of these APIs should be reviewed periodically. Moreover, the government should make efforts to revive PSUs and assign PSUs the task of producing APIs that require large investments or special drugs usually termed as Orphan Drugs, those which cater to a very small population and hence may not be viable for the private sector to manufacture.

Government should consider to evolve a Cost Disadvantage Neutralization (CDN) mechanism as incentive that can be made available to the formulators procuring APIs from indigenous manufacturers by discontinuing the use of hitherto imported APIs. Besides, the local manufacturers should be provided suitable handholding at least for initial two years, so that they can compete in overseas markets while entering into the export contracts, the Task Force recommended.

It also asked the government to devise a Drug Indigenization Support (DIS) for the local pharma companies to start indigenous production of critical APIs that are used particularly for NLEMs but are predominantly imported so far. The Task Forces also recommended that to stimulate demand for locally produced APIs, the government should consider restricting import of certain priority APIs through amendment in the foreign trade policy.