As stipulated in the Decree on Drugs (Price Control) 2013, the NPPA sets the ceiling price for essential drugs in Schedule I. According to the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA), "few" drugs will be taken care of as part of patient relief measures.
The regulator was to fix and review drug prices, and in January this year, when it had reduced the prices of 33 drugs, more than 620 drugs were placed under price control in April 2016. "Next Authority meeting of NPPA on March 9; Few more drugs to come under price control," NPPA said in a tweet.
The regulator will also hold a second round of meetings with stent manufacturers and importers on March 7, 2017 to review stent positions and plans for the next six months.
The calculation of the price of essential drugs is based on the simple average rates of all drugs in a particular therapeutic segment with sales of more than 1 percent. For medicines that are not under price control, manufacturers are allowed to increase the maximum retail price by 10 percent per year.
The Government had notified the 2013 DPCO, which covers 680 formulations, effective May 15, 2014, replacing the 1995 Order regulating the prices of only 74 bulk drugs.
