The Union Minister of Chemicals & Fertilizers Ananth Kumar launched a mobile app to help buyers find the correct price of medicines.
Called ‘Pharma Sahi Daam’- the app shows the maximum retail price fixed by National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) for various scheduled drugs on real time basis.
On the occassion of NPPA Foundation Day, the Minister appealed to the industry leaders, state governments and other departments in pooling efforts to make available medicines at affordable prices to the common man.
¨In the last two and a half years, almost 900 formulations have been brought under the price control, providing a saving of about 5000 crores to the consumers. National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has already come out with ceiling price of 368 new drugs within 6 months of the issue of New National List of Essential Medicines-2015¨ he further added.
The Minister said that he is pursuing the case for making an independent Ministry for Pharmaceuticals so that all decisions regarding the industry could be taken under a single roof.
The pharmaceutical industry has risen to almost $37 billion and Indian medicines are being exported to over 200 countries. Pharmaceuticals is a sunrise industry and the Government is keen to provide support to it through various means like pharmaceutical parks, medical devices parks, pharmaceutical clusters and promotion of innovation through Atal Innovation Scheme, he added.
A strategy is being adopted to provide cheap medicines to the common man- one is through regulating the prices by NPPA and another is opening of PM Jan Aushadhi Stores. He said that within one year, 3000 PM Jan Aushadhi Stores will be opened in the country covering all districts and administrative divisions.
The Minister further said that most of the medicines in Jan Aushadhi stores cost 30 to 40 per cent as compared to the market cost and no medicine in Jan Aushadhi Store is more than 50 per cent of the market cost.