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New Delhi: To curb the menace of spurious and sub-standard drugs and address the non-conformity of quality standards among diagnostic centres across the country, the office of principal scientific advisor to the Prime Minister has constituted a working group committee. The mandate of the committee is to recommend in next nine months time, scientific and technological measures that can be implemented to reduce the incidence of spurious and sub-standard drugs.
The committee that was formally put in place recently has started functioning with the first meeting, taking place at the end of December 2008. The PSA working group, chaired by PN Tandon, professor emeritus, All India Institute of Medical Sciences has representation from the medical fraternity, Drug Controller General of India, medical journal, industry and consumer rights organisation apart from representative of PSA’s office. The purview of the new committee includes studying the prevailing and planned international practices adopted world wide to tackle the evil of spurious drugs, particularly in case of regulated markets like the United States of America and other countries in Europe. The expert group will also analyse the status of the problem in the country and then suggest specific scientific measures that can be taken up to address the social evil.
Asked if the scope of the committee will overlap and clash with that of Mashelkar Committee, a member said, “On the contrary it should complement the earlier recommendation. While Mashelkar recommendation focused on tightening of regulatory framework and making the penalties of guilty drug manufacturers stringent, the purview of the current working group is to concentrate on strictly scientific measures and R&D steps that can bring down the incidences of spurious and sub-standard drugs”.
In 2003, the government had constituted a committee under the chairmanship of RA Mashelkar, former director general, CSIR to comprehensively examine the issue of spurious drugs. The committee that submitted its report in December 2006 had suggested that penalties for such spurious drugmakers be made more stringent apart from other measures like setting up of special courts for speedy trials and making the offences relating to spurious drugs non-bailable. Last July, the Cabinet gave its nod to move official amendments to Drug and Cosmetic Amendment Bill, 2005 that prescribes an imprisonment for a term for not less than 10 years which may be extended to life term and fine of not less than Rs 10 lakh or three times value of the drugs confiscated,...
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