Why India is the ‘Pharmacy’ of the Developing World



Developing countries across the world face several challenges, key among which is providing their people with affordable medicines of high-quality.
A ‘public first’ approach to policy, strict medicine patent law and doctors wh have used reverse-engineering to introduce generic drugs, are some of the reasons that India has emerged as the ‘pharmacy’ of the developing world.

1.     Millions of people around the world rely on affordable medicines made in India to stay alive
Before 2005, India did not grant product patents on medicines. This allowed for the production of low-cost, generic versions of medicines that were patented in other countries.
Indian manufacturers, with their reverse engineering skills, were the first to market low-cost versions of the life-saving cancer and HIV drugs within a few years of their US launch. Robust competition among generic producers in India has resulted in a price reduction of more than 99 percent for medicines across different therapeutic areas, including Hepatitis C, HIV/AIDS, Malaria, Tuberculosis and medicine for non-communicable diseases that are critical for public health programmes.
2.     Access to affordable HIV treatment from India is one of the greatest success stories in medicine
Big pharmaceutical corporations with patent monopolies were charging over $10,00 per patient per year for antiretrovirals, thereby making treatment economically unviable for millions of patients in the developing world.
Dr. Yussef Hamied from India electrified the world by announcing that the generic company Cipla would manufacture and supply the triple fixed-dose combination of HIV antiretorvirals at $1 a day, a 99.99 percent price cut.$1 a day, a 99.99 percent price cut.
Today, India is the world’s primary source of affordable HIV medicines as it is one of the few countries with the capacity to quickly produce newer HIV drugs as generics.
Governments of developing countries have also initiated HIV treatment programmes using generically produced medicines from India. These programmes benefit more than 15 million people who are living with HIV/ AIDS.
3.     India is one of the biggest suppliers of low-cost vaccines in the world
The recombinant Hepatitis B vaccine is an excellent example of one of India’s low cost medicines. Large multinational pharmaceutical companies held a complete monopoly on the vaccine and ensured that the price of the drug was high. At $23 per dose, a manufacturer in India saw an unmet need and, in the absence of patent barriers, developed a Hepatitis B vaccine to reduce the price of the drug to less than $1 per dose. Today India is a main supplier of vaccines to UNICEF and to the Ministries of Health in numerous countries.

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