New Delhi, Sept 20: To bolster transparency in the drug regulatory system, the union health ministry has directed all state drug controllers to profile pharmaceutical companies within their jurisdiction.
Around 10,500 entities are currently producing varied dosage forms and active pharmaceutical ingredients in the country.
The objective is to ascertain the types of drug formulations being manufactured, imported, and exported, giving the central government a clear picture of the industry's landscape.
All State Drug Controllers have been directed to collate data from the various manufacturing units located within our jurisdictions on urgent basis, which will allow us to keep a close eye on the functioning of such firms.
Pharma companies have been asked to give information about their manufacturing site, the number of sites they are holding, their unit-wise annual turnover, the kind of drug formulations they are manufacturing, exporting and importing, etc.,
This data will shed light on the domestic industry's financial and technological challenges in making India future-ready in the global market as there have been allegations that these medicines were linked to child fatalities, tarnishing India's reputation as the 'pharmacy of the world'.
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